# Few questions about buying/selling in Questrade?



## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Hello everyone. I made the plunge and opened a Questrade account (TFSA) just to start out small. I have a couple of positions in WEF.TO Western Forest Products and a position in PHM.VN Patient Home Monitoring. When I bought these two I used "LIMIT ORDER" as opposed to "MARKET ORDER". I bought both in lots of 100, 400 shares of WEF and 400 shares of PHM. 

My questions are:

So when I bought I just used the BID price that was shown in the box. So it would look something like this BID $2.35 ASK $2.37. Are you removing liquidity from the market with a scenario such as this? Could you bid a bit below at say $2.30? Thanks for any assistance. I tell ya it's pretty fun so far. Probably switch to ETF's soon but just thought I'd start real small and learn a bit as I go. If any of these two drop a bit I'll add a bit more. I'm still at free commisions for a bit longer so that helps too. Thanks.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

The set limit price is the price you are willing to pay for the stock as opposed to the market price which is the lowest price offered (ask price) at the time your buy order was received.

You can set your bid (limit order) to whatever you want, I usually set it below the current bid/ask levels. If the price drops to that level before your limit order expires, you get the stock. If it doesn't, you don't. If you really want the stock, you pay market rates, if you're willing to risk buying it for a better price, then you put in limit prices.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Just a Guy, thanks for your feedback. I appreciate it.


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## CPA Candidate (Dec 15, 2013)

With small caps, I always bid low and let volatility fill the order. Be patient. Stocks are going up and down 5% a day, get in at a good price.


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## Flash (Nov 25, 2014)

From what I have learned in the last 6 months, I noticed that it's not worth to be nit picky. When you decide you want to buy a stock, you decided the current price is good. Bidding under even by 5c, you risk not buying that stock at all and lose the opportunity to enter at a low price that you had in mind. Usually under bidding by 5-10c does not save you more than 5-10$, depending how many you are buying. Your 5-10$ potential savings IMO is not worth the risk of your order never triggering, and risk that stock to keep appreciating from that point on. 

Another thing with Questrade, is unless you pay for live data, what you see is actually delayed by 15-20 minutes, so unless you use a big bank brokerage that comes with live data, you can't really know if the price you see on Questrade is actually higher or lower. Google finance has it delayed 20 min for TSE as well, but it's live data for NYSE/NASDAQ, so I guess you don't need a second brokerage for live data if you plan to buy US stock.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Thanks CPA Candidate and Flash.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Yeah I'd like to have the live data but I didn't feel like I needed it. I'm starting to rethink that idea but I'm not sure it would be worth it for the little trading I do. So when you bid 15 minutes behind the current price and the stock has gone up a bit then are you getting a discount?


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Not if you put in a market price. If you read flash boys by Michael Lewis, he implies that some companies may be inflating the prices of market price transactions to profit from it (not usually from individual trades, more on institutional trades). It's only a few cents, but over millions of transactions it can add up.

Personally, unlike flash, I've rarely lost out on a bid over 5-10 cents (especially if the stock is over $10)...most stocks are pretty volatile over a day...take a look at the history of the "day high/low" to give you some idea of where you could probably lower your bid. Also, look at the trend of the stock, if it's heading down, there's a good chance to get a lower bid, if it's going up, then the chance may not be good.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Great info, thanks.


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## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

NSVet said:


> So when I bought I just used the BID price that was shown in the box. So it would look something like this BID $2.35 ASK $2.37. Are you removing liquidity from the market with a scenario such as this? Could you bid a bit below at say $2.30? .


You are adding liquidity to the market when you purchase at the current price/market price.
You are not adding or removing liquidity when using a limit order unless your limit order gets filled.

To be honest - you should only ever use limit orders and not market orders. I always bid below the price, unless the Bid/Ask ratio is heavily not in my favour.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

So why is everything delayed 15 minutes? Is there a way to get online access to real time quotes (free of course)? I'm guessing no since nobody would pay for the real time data.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Some brokerages offer it to clients, but you can't get real time quotes in general. Also, real time is kind of questionable due to the delay in information travel time. It may only be a fraction of a second, but there are those who have taken advantage of even that delay.


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## NSVet (Dec 13, 2014)

Just a Guy said:


> Some brokerages offer it to clients, but you can't get real time quotes in general. Also, real time is kind of questionable due to the delay in information travel time. It may only be a fraction of a second, but there are those who have taken advantage of even that delay.


Thanks for your insight. Much appreciated.


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