When I place a virtual trade in TOS On Demand to buy a stock at the open, there is a 1 minute delay before the order is executed. Basically the order gets filled at 9:31 am EST instead of 9:30 am EST, causing me to get fills that are not accurate. Is there any way to fix this?
I am not familiar with TOS, but try placing the virtual trade and the previous days close. That might result in a fill at the open as that is how most backtesters operate.
Thanks, I tried that with no luck. I also tried placing the order in the pre-market, and that wouldn't get it to trip at the open either. I have a meeting set up with TD Amer to walk me through a tutorial of TOS On Demand monday morning, so I will see what they say. I also wish Thinkorswim had an automatic, cancel-all orders/flatten position type of order based on time of day that you could use to flatten a position in a stock at a pre-determined time of day...say 15:55 hours EST just 5 mins before the close. I'm trying to implement a fully automated entry and exit day trade strategy, where all i have to do is decide on a position size the night before the market opens, and then the trade executions are automatic. Oh wait, i think see the answer to that. Market-on-Close orders at TD Amer create a close of the position as close to market closing price as possible. But unfortunately i can't find that order in the platform.
ToS weirdly enough doesn't have MOC order type in its "Snap Ticket". Does have it in the "Order Entry" tab though. In the "Snap Ticket" you have to enter it as a "Market" order with the Expiration of "Market on Close". Which is pretty un-intuitive.
to be realistic in real world you should avoid - on close, on open orders. testing has shown that typically 30 minutes after the open to 15 minutes before the close are the meat of the market.
Oh, wow. I see that now. On Demand has the MOC order, too, so i'm going to play around with it in testing. Thanks!
I had the meeting with the TD Amer trading specialist today, and we actually figured out how to create one complex order that gets it all done. Basically it's a buy market order and you specify exact time of day (i.e. 10:00 EST) that executes the buy and triggers a OCA order where there is a sell order/trailing stop of X% along with another sell market order that executes at a time of day you specify (i.e. 15:45 EST). Whichever sell order executes first will cancel the other sell order.
He couldn't figure out how to make thinkondemand execute backtest trades that kick off on the open...they are always going to be 1 minute delayed. Also, trailing stop and regular stop orders don't seem to work on thinkondemand for backtesting, which is kind of a bummer, because that would save a lot of manual backtesting.