Order execution policy

1. Execution factors

For retail clients, total cost, meaning price together with all associated charges, is normally the most important factor.

• Price and total cost of the transaction.
• Speed and likelihood of execution and settlement.
• Size and nature of the order.
• Market conditions, including volatility and available liquidity.

2. We are the counterparty to your trade

We operate a dealing desk. When you trade, you trade with us rather than on an exchange, and we hedge that exposure with our liquidity providers as we see fit. This means our interests and yours are not automatically aligned, and the safeguards below exist because of that. Our conflicts of interest policy sets out the wider position.

3. Accepted now, recorded when we have covered it

An order is not filled the instant you place it. We quote you a price, accept the order, and hold it for a working window while we cover the trade. Only then is the position recorded to your account. The length of that window is published in the platform and shown on the order ticket before you confirm, and it can extend to thirty minutes where an order has to be worked by hand across several accounts.

The window is our time, not your risk. Every fill is measured against the price you were quoted, not against whatever the market has done by the time we record it. You can withdraw an order at any point before it is recorded, and the margin it holds is returned to your free balance immediately.

4. Slippage, in both directions

If the market has moved against you by more than the tolerance on your order by the time we come to record it, we reject the order and tell you why. We do not fill it at the worse price on the grounds that time has passed. If the market has moved in your favour, you receive the better price in full: we do not withhold price improvement, and we do not trim it back to the quote.

Every fill records the quoted price, the filled price and the difference between them, signed to show whether it went for or against you. You can see this on your own orders, and we monitor the aggregate for symmetry.

5. Execution venues

We source pricing from third party liquidity providers and reference public market data. We select and review venues on the basis of pricing quality, reliability, cost and settlement performance, and we may add or remove a venue where doing so improves outcomes for clients.

6. Specific instructions

Where you give a specific instruction, such as a limit price or a slippage tolerance, we execute the order following that instruction. Doing so may prevent us from taking the steps in this policy to obtain the best possible result for the part of the order covered by your instruction.

7. Order types and handling

Market, limit, stop and reduce only orders behave as described in the platform documentation. Orders are handled sequentially and fairly, and entries and exits go through the same working window: we do not delay one and fill the other instantly. In disrupted markets we may widen spreads, reject orders, or suspend trading in an instrument.

8. Monitoring and review

We monitor execution quality on an ongoing basis, including the average slippage on filled orders and the balance between fills that go for and against clients. We review this policy at least annually, and whenever a material change affects our ability to obtain the best possible result. Material changes are published on this page.