Futures Order Stairs

FOS is designed to place orders on futures and options automatically and to make profit on price fluctuations in the specified range. The idea of FOS is to create a grid of bids and asks. When an order is filled, the system places an opposite order at the neighboring price.

To open the FOS Manager window, click the button.

Futures Order Stairs

Right-click on the desired stair to open a commands list, where you can:

  • Open the stair settings window;
  • Start FOS;
  • Stop FOS; and
  • Delete FOS.

Some commands might be unavailable. To activate them, open the settings window by double-clicking on the stair name.

Futures Order Stairs settings window

General operations

Create a new stair

To create order stairs:

  1. Click the button on the top toolbar of the FOS manager window. The Add new FOS window will open.

    FOS manager window

  2. Enter the FOS name in the text field.

    Adding new FOS

  3. Select an account.

    Any number of order stairs can work on the same trading account, but on different strategies.

  4. Select a strategy or enter a strategy name in the text field. If a strategy with the specified name does not exist in the selected account and portfolio, then it will be created.

    Note that you cannot create one on actual strategy.

  5. Select an underlying asset.

  6. Click the OK button or press the Enter key.

The new Order stairs will appear in the FOS list.

FOS list

Start FOS

To start FOS you need, double-click on the stair’s name.

Start FOS

After the Settings window opens, click the button in the top toolbar.

FOS settings window

When an order is filled, the midmarket is set to the order price. An opposite order is placed at the previous midmarket. The fills generated by FOS are accumulated in the FOS strategy. A process of automatic trading is determined by the set of parameters (see FOS parameters).

Stop FOS

To stop trading, click the button.

Delete FOS

To delete FOS, click the button.

FOS parameters

FOS is configured using the following parameters:

  • Midmarket – base price to place orders from. The Take market button sets the midmarket to current market price

  • Orders number– number of orders of each direction in the grid

  • Quantity – order size

  • Price step – step in the order grid

  • Upper stop price – upper price to stop FOS at

  • Lower stop price – lower price to stop FOS at

    To deactivate Upper stop price / Lower stop price parameters you need to specify 0 value.

  • Slippage – order price offset to the best price. This parameter affects orders placed to close current position. The position is closed when FOS is stopped at any of the stop prices

  • Position – current position

FOS parameters

When you enter parameters, an order stairs is created.

Orders

The scale shows the current price , orders to buy and to sell , and the stop price .

Scale

When an order is filled, the system places an opposite order at the neighboring price.

Orders to buy/sell

When the Upper/Lower stop price is reached, FOS will be stopped and the current position will be closed at the market price (with respect to the Slippage parameter). All the fills generated by close position order will be displayed in the FOS strategy.

Schedule

FOS supports activity scheduling. You may read more about it in the Schedule.