Stock Trading Grade: A
Overview:
Thinkorswim has an excellent trading engine. The interface design is well done. Opening and closing positions is fast and intuitive. Canceling and modifying orders that have not yet executed is a snap. Thinkorswim offers a wide selection of order types in additional to conditional orders. Traders utilizing advanced strategies owe it to themselves to give thinkorswim a try.
Order Types:
See our Order Types page for an explanation of order types
Market
Limit
Market On Close
Limit On Close
Stop Loss
Stop Limit
Trailing Stop Loss $
Trailing Stop Loss %
Trailing Stop Limit $
Trailing Stop Limit %
Conditional
Details:
The below descriptions are for trade activity I initiated using the desktop version of thinkorswim. Trading can also be done in the same manner using the web application.
I made an order to buy 10 shares of GLD, the SPDR gold ETF, at a limit price of $89.00 (click on images for larger views):
My trade was good for the day but good until canceled orders with an unspecified expiration period are also available. A dialog box popped up asking me to confirm my order:
The trade has now been entered into the system and the order book list appears:
Users can cancel or modify orders prior to execution. Canceled orders are immediately updated with a status of "Canceled" while a new row is created acknowledging the canceled order with a status of "U R OUT." Modified orders show the same information with the addition of the new trade displaying in the order book immediately.
Current day trade information is found on the activity and positions page while thirty days worth of history is found on the account statement page:
I decided to sell my position, so from the account statement page I right clicked on my position and selected to create a closing order:
Related articles: thinkorswim Registration, thinkorswim Charts, thinkorswim Research