Adding underlying futures legs to options spreads in TWS

A

aw779

Hi, any time I go to transmit an options spread which involves the purchase or sale of the underlying futures contract I get an error message saying "unsupported type".

See image:
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This happens no matter the structure of the spread or the underlying market, so long as a futures contracts included.

However I can put on the same spread but with synthetic shorts/longs in lieu of the futures contract and they let me do it. This isn't really a viable solution however because it makes delta hedging slightly more difficult.

For clarity:
I can buy an ES futures contract separately.
I can buy an ES put separately.
I can buy an ES put + plus a synthetic ES long.
I can't buy an ES put + buy an ES futures contract.

Has it something to do with how the risk dept interprets the position?

I'm on a TWS paper trade account if that matters.

Any help/insight would be appreciated. Thanks.
 
I never traded a combo of futures options and future contracts, but I did see such error messages when entering order types and parameters unsupported by specific exchange. For example (some?) futures exchanges don’t support “DTC” expirations (Day Till Cancelled) (I first thought this should be broker specific but maybe IB tries to send such orders to exchanges, or there is no “day” definition for it), or orders with too many legs or too many options per leg.
This seems to be exchange specific, while futures options exchanges are generally more limited than equity options exchanges. Paper accounts may even have more limitations as they may not send orders to exchanges for final validation and therefore make some internal assumptions that could be outdated. (?)
(can’t provide good answer here, just tidbits, as not sure if/when someone else will)
 
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I’d add that at IB I can usually see that something’s wrong with my order, as when I’m creating an “invalid” order I don’t see the margin that it will use up. Basically the required margin shows as soon as you start creating an order in the options strategy window, but if you add some invalid leg then the margin will disappear. In my case this happens most often when trying to buy a leg of an option that I’m already selling through another combo order (we’re not allowed to place opposite orders against the same legs at the same time).
This is just a tip that you may be able to see that an order is invalid by the margin amount disappearing when you add a leg that would’ve made it invalid. Not sure if that’s alway true though, especially on paper accounts.
 
aw779 said:
...
For clarity:
I can buy an ES futures contract separately.
I can buy an ES put separately.
I can buy an ES put + plus a synthetic ES long.
I can't buy an ES put + buy an ES futures contract.

Has it something to do with how the risk dept interprets the position?

I'm on a TWS paper trade account if that matters.

Any help/insight would be appreciated. Thanks.
More...

Not sure how the FOP thing all works, but it looks like your future outright order has a date attached to it? Why Jun 26th?
 
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