Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
Using simulation, after I bought a contract in a market, the chart stopped moving so that was a little concerning. I clicked "Sell" since I couldn't see anything and closed the program out and am checking with support on what more I've got to figure out with all this craziness.
I come back a few hours later and notice the Continuum demo account is showing a green number on unrealized PnL so I thought to click "Accounts" and select what was in there and "close".
It then audibly said order fulfilled and back on the chart i see a "Close".
So can someone help me understand the difference between the two? I guess I got lucky on this "trade" but this could have been bad if it was a real account and went down.
Look at the quantities for each trade, as shown on the chart.
You didn't buy "a" contract, you bought 2 ("Buy 2 @ 13235.50"). Then when you sold the first time, marked by the arrow, you sold one of them ("Sell 1 @ 13284.75") . That gave you 1 left, as @Koepisch pointed out. Since you still had an open position (1 contract), when you hit "Close," it closed you out by selling that additional contract, with "Close 1 @ 13315.75."
The difference between the two is that you had lost track of how many contracts you had in your position. The final "Close" was also a final "Sell" that closed your position.
So, two things about this:
(1) This happens to everybody sometimes, leaving part of a position open because of a simple error. Probably when you clicked "Sell" the first time, you didn't notice that it had an amount listed, probably the default of 1. You probably assumed it was going to sell out everything. (I'm not using NT, but most platforms will have a button labeled something like "Flatten" or "Close All" -- that's your way to just get out without specifying how many to sell.)
(2) This simple mistake can be disastrous.
Don't worry about the fact that you did it, since it's on sim. But pay attention when you click that mouse. Those little clicks can be dangerous.
Bob.
When one door closes, another opens.
-- Cervantes, Don Quixote