Is the specialist screwd up or it is normal business at NYSE?

O

orion895

Guys,

Please let me know what you think:

Today at 9:24am I entered an orders to short OPG of
DHR at 73.92. The stock closing price was 74.00, and
the specialist opened the stock at 9:34am at 74.01 on an uptick and canceling my orders at the same time. I believe I am entitled to my fill. The company I am trading through told me that
"exchange informed us that in this instance the last sell short order to participate in the opening was entered at 9:03 am."

It just doesn't make any logical nor business sense to me that the specialist stops an order flow from their clients 30 minutes
before the open, posts no indication to facilitate more orders if he has imbalance, and opens on an uptick. Anybody can explain?
 
Short orders are the last in the queue to fill on the open. The stock would have had to trade through your price to get that fill.

Then it comes down to time in queue....could have been others ahead of you, which means "no soup for you!"
 
Thank you, Mike. I can handle "no soup" in this case, but I was really surprised by the answer from the floor. Sometimes when you are sending orders really close to 9:30, he has already "finished matching orders" and you are not getting filled - fine...but 9:03am!! I thought that's his job to post indications to attract more buyers and/or open the stock at such price that most orders are matched. Does the reason they gave me sound legitimate to you? It happens a lot?
 
Quote from orion895:

Thank you, Mike. I can handle "no soup" in this case, but I was really surprised by the answer from the floor. Sometimes when you are sending orders really close to 9:30, he has already "finished matching orders" and you are not getting filled - fine...but 9:03am!! I thought that's his job to post indications to attract more buyers and/or open the stock at such price that most orders are matched. Does the reason they gave me sound legitimate to you? It happens a lot?
More...

I ran into that problem once before....you only run into a problem if it opens at your price. If it opens through your price, you have a pretty good case to get the fill, assuming your order was in at least a few minutes prior to the stock opening. BTW, that is very powerful trading information, IMO. In that sense, you might be able to make even more next time.

In your case, the previous close was @ 74 and in all likelihood, a down tick, given the previous days price action.
 
If the closing sale from the prior day 74 was a + tick you should have received an execution. The ticks carry over from the prior day on NYSE. Therefore your order would be "held" at 94 and you would be due a fill at the opening.
 
Quote from orion895:

Thank you, Mike. I can handle "no soup" in this case, but I was really surprised by the answer from the floor. Sometimes when you are sending orders really close to 9:30, he has already "finished matching orders" and you are not getting filled - fine...but 9:03am!! I thought that's his job to post indications to attract more buyers and/or open the stock at such price that most orders are matched. Does the reason they gave me sound legitimate to you? It happens a lot?
More...

your order might also have the auto refresh setting on it so it resends a new order every few minutes, which would bump you to the back of the line. i think NYSE took away the fee for leaving orders out there but im sure alot of ppl still have this feature on in their trading platform.

if you had a sell order below the opening price, you must be filled. since you had a short order, it is possible that there wasnt enough stock to fill your order. i've had mkt open orders with the same price as the opening price and have gotten zero fills or partial fills.
 
I'm reminded of Richard Ney's anecdote :

"The story is told that after he had been deported to Italy, Lucky Luciano granted an interview in which he described a visit to the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. When the operations of floor specialists had been explained to him, he said, 'A terrible thing happened. I realized I'd joined the wrong mob.'"

No surprise that the Street refers to us retail investors as "meat."

Careful what you trade ...
 
I will repeat what I sais before and then everyone can continue to blame the specialist without knowing the rules. Tick from prior day is relevant. I have no idea why people think they can make money trading in markets that they don't even know the basic rules for.
 
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