I placed a sell order today, and it didn't get represented for several minutes. Meanwhile, the price traded through my price, and then dropped back down.
Power Etrade Support's response was that the customer agreement allows them to arbitrarily review orders and hold them up for 3 minutes.
As it says in the customer agreement:
Though orders are usually routed to the marketplace within seconds, certain orders, at
E*TRADE's sole discretion, may be subject to manual review and entry, which may cause delays
in the processing of your orders. You also understand that you will receive the price at
which your order executes in the marketplace, which may be different from the price at
which the security or option is trading when your order is entered into our system.
This means that although they are providing Level II, and RT quotes, if you see a bid or offer that you want to hit, then forget about any guarantee of a timely execution.
This was not some wildly trading Internet stock. It cost me 1/8 on 1000 shares.
They usually provide good representation and good fills, and their Stop Loss orders saved me a bundle yesterday, but if they are providing Level 2 and a special trading screen, they also should provide the execution speed that is necessary in that environment.
Keep this in mind if you are considering Etrade for rapid trading. |
