I sent an email to Mike Murphy about this, and he said, “I can take a look at this Monday, but I recommend posting this in the forum and one of our devs will post a video for you.” So I am making my first post in this forum and hopefully one of you devs can post a video for me.
So hopefully this screenshot shows up on your screen properly. I’m using the browser application in Firefox, but it’s probably the same thing in the desktop platform.
So anyway, I’m using the “spreads” widget in order to set up an options trade with multiple legs, as Mike suggested to me in a previous email. As you can see, I have set up 3 legs in my spreads widget. Now I have a few questions regarding this:
How do you actually place the trade? I can only set it up in the spreads widget, but I’m not sure how to actually execute the options trade.
How do you select 3 different strike prices? This particular options trade that I have set up requires me to use 3 different strike prices and I can’t select the same strike price for all 3 legs. I typed in the same symbol (6B.N23 in this case) for each leg, but I’m not sure how to select individual strike prices for each leg.
How do you select the expiration dates? This particular symbol should have an expiration date everyday, so how do you select an expiration 1 day out? 2 days out? 3 days out? etc.
BTW, I am using a demo account, as you can see in the top right corner of my screenshot. I am assuming that the demo account has the full functionality of a real account, but if not, and that some of these functions are only available in the real account, then just let me know.
I tried to describe my questions as clear as possible for you, but if there’s anything that you don’t understand, just send me a message and I can try to clarify things for you as best as I can.
After entering the proper legs, please click ‘find’ - The spread will either be found or created and added to your quote board. Once added, you can place an order on the spread.
You do this by entering the symbol for each option/strike in the spread builder. To find an option or symbol, please use the symbol finder that is built into both the spread builder and quotes widget.
Expirations are part of the symbol syntax. We use the same symbol syntax as the exchange. I recommend you use the symbol finder here as well as it will include the expiration in the symbol.
Side note: you will not be able to create spreads in the demo because the spreads widget actually creates the spread for you at the exchange. This is not possible in a demo account.
Yes I see that when I click on “find” and then “create”, it pops up a window that says, “Can’t create spread. Spread creation is not available for demo accounts”. I was hoping to test this out fully (the entire process from the beginning all the way through placing the trade) in the demo account, but I guess it cannot be done then.
Now one other thing, I did type in this symbol (6B.N23) into the symbol finder, but this is the only option that comes up:
I don’t see any option to select different strikes or different expiration dates that are part of the symbol syntax. So for this particular instrument (6B.N23), could you show me the different strikes and expiration dates on this symbol? (ideally with a picture or screenshot of your screen)
Again, if that’s also not available on the demo account, then just let me know as soon as possible.
The options video linked above would help you past this - Just click the three dots on the right, then select options. From there you can select any series of options where the underlying futures contract is 6B.N23.
Spread creation is not available on demo - demo accounts cannot create spreads at the exchange level since they are not real trading accounts.
DISCLAIMER: There is a substantial risk of loss in trading commodity futures and options products. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results.
