1

I bought a stock in paper trading. The chart showed that the price was $5 and I ended up paying $6.17. Did higher volume cause that?

*I bought at 18:50(Central European Standard Time) on margin acc and I used market price. On thinkorswim papermoney.

Improve this question
6
  • btw i bought EQ stock on 11/11/2020
    – Brosky
    Nov 11, 2020 at 17:59
  • 1
    Did you bid with a fixed price, or market price? Perhaps the most recent trade occurred at $5, but it was an illiquid stock with few sales, and by the time a next trade occurred, the price had jumped (perhaps because you placed the order overnight, and your paper trade occurred when trading opened the next day, and there had been news overnight that changed the price?)
    – Grade 'Eh' Bacon
    Nov 11, 2020 at 19:05
  • @Grade 'Eh' Bacon - Those are all possible reasons for a bad fill but none of them apply to this situation. 27.4 million shares have traded today with no gaps.
    – Bob Baerker
    Nov 11, 2020 at 19:11
  • 1
    Perhaps you could tell us what paper trading platform you are using (is it thinkorswim's paperMoney?). You could also post a screenshot of your trade history and some charts.
    – Flux
    Nov 12, 2020 at 3:13
  • 1
    This is why you should always use a limit order (where you specify a maximum price). Especially for smaller and less liquid stocks.
    – Kaz
    Nov 12, 2020 at 3:20

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
7

There's no way that anyone could know the answer. You could have been looking at the wrong chart. You could have misread the price. Perhaps the chart was correct but your virtual trader was providing delayed quotes. It's all a guess.

The only thing that can be verified is if you post a trade execution time, it can be determined what the price of the stock was at the moment in time.

The only determinable fact at this point is that EQ has traded between $3.53 and $6.44 today.

EDIT

From your question as well as additional information offered in your subsequent comments:

The chart showed that the price was $5 and I ended up paying $6.17. Did higher volume cause that?

I bought at 18:50 (Central European Standard Time)

The opening price for that one minute was 6.06 x 6.07

The closing price for that one minute was 6.02 x 6.03

During that one minute interval, EQ traded as high as 6.23 (6.22 x 6.23 at 12:50:17)

Circa 12:50:08, about 3,600 shares were purchased at 6.17 in about a 20 or so transactions.

Note that my time stamps are EST which is 6 hours ahead of your time.

Conclusion?

You paid the correct price.

I used market price and I used Thinkorswim papermoney (20min delayed data)

20 minutes earlier than your purchase, EQ was trading around 5.17

Final Conclusion?

The culprit for the confusion here is 20 minute delayed quotes. At 12:50 EST, you were looking at the price in the vicinity of 5.00 representing the price from 12:30 EST (delayed) and a market order at 12:50 EST purchased shares in real time at $6.17.

Improve this answer
3
  • I bought at 18:50(Central European Standard Time) on margin acc I used market price.
    – Brosky
    Nov 13, 2020 at 13:38
  • "Circa 12:50:08, about 3,600 shares were purchased at 6.17 ..." How do you know this? Is it by using some kind of data subscription from your stock broker?
    – Flux
    Nov 14, 2020 at 0:41
  • 1
    My broker provides Time & Sales for free. All it took to see the info that I posted was to type in the date and the time and then scroll through data. An illiquid stock could encompass only a page or two for the entire day. This one had about 20 pages for that one minute period.
    – Bob Baerker
    Nov 14, 2020 at 0:57
2

You bought it around 12:57 PM? This is why I rarely use a 'market' order.

enter image description here

Improve this answer
1
  • If he bought the stock around 12:57 PM then his buy price wasn't far from the high of the day. That's just bad timing. However it doesn't explain the OP's confusion with thinking that the stock was $5 at that time. The chart doesn't support such a disparity so something funky happened: maybe he was looking at bad data or he looked at the wrong price or maybe the paper trader is ka-ka.
    – Bob Baerker
    Nov 11, 2020 at 21:11
0

Most charts are based on sell/bid quotes, I haven't seen any chart that's based on buy/ask price, so when you buy something then you need to add the spread; Especially when the spread is floating or during high volatility then the price you get might have a big difference than what was shown in the real time chart. When your broker received your order and send it to Liquidity Providers, then the LP's might fill or reject/requote your order based on the availability of the exact opposite of your order. Let say if you buy at xx price, then you need some one on the opposite site to sell at xx, if this condition was not met then the price need adjustment. Also different brokers and LPs might have slightly different charts, that's why I think candle analysis is not reliable.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .