Updated Wednesday, July 27, 2011



Note: On June 11, 2009, thinkorswim was acquired by TD Ameritrade.  Because of this, as of July 27, 2011, all new accounts must be opened through TD Ameritrade.  Existing thinkorswim accounts will soon be transferred from clearing firm Penson Financial Services to TD Ameritrade Clearing, Inc.  Existing customers can still trade on the thinkorswim desktop platform for the time being but web and mobile trading must be done on TD Ameritrade platforms.  For the purposes of this site, please read our TD Ameritrade reviews as we will no longer be covering thinkorswim.

Overview:

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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:

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See our Order Types page for an explanation of order types

• Market
• Limit
• Stop Loss
• Stop Limit
• Trailing Stop Loss $
• Trailing Stop Loss %
• Trailing Stop Limit $
• Trailing Stop Limit %
• Market On Close
• Limit On Close
• One Cancels Other (OCO)
• One Triggers All (OTA)
• One Triggers Other (OTO)
• One Triggers Two (OTT)
• One Triggers One Cancels Other (OTOCO)
• One Triggers Two Cancels Other (OT2OCO)
• One Triggers Three Cancels Other (OT3OCO)

Details:

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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:

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