Our technology is engineered for speed, stability and better prices – giving you the edge in a competitive environment.
Execution and pricing technology
How we provide fast, reliable execution
Our systems are built to cope with a huge number of trades very quickly:
- Over 22 million orders accepted (Apr-Jun 16)
And our robust platforms are engineered to cope with large volumes of traffic:
- 42,040 unique daily web users (12 months to August 2016)
- 52,754 unique daily mobile users (12 months to August 2016
How we give you the best price
Markets can move in milliseconds, meaning the price you click to trade on may have changed by the time your order reaches us.
IG's order management system will never fill you at a level worse than the one you requested – however your order may be rejected.
- A symmetrical tolerance level is set a certain distance either side of your requested price – if the market stays within this range by the time we receive your order, your order will be executed at the level you requested. If you submit a market order it will be filled in the size and price available when we receive it.
Should the price move outside this range, we will do one of two things:
- If the market moves to a better level for you, our price improvement technology will ensure you receive it. We've saved our clients over £55 million in this way since January 2013.
- If the price moves beyond our tolerance in the opposite direction, we'll reject the order and ask you to resubmit at the current level.
Two new ways to trade
We now offer you even more control over your order execution, with partial fills and points through current. These new features are available on the trading platform and the latest version of the IG mobile trading app. For full terms see our customer agreement page.
Partial fills
We now offer clients partial fills on their online trades. If you are a client who trades in large size you will be able to accept a partial fill to increase your chance of a successful execution.
If you choose to use this feature, IG will only ever partially fill your order as an alternative to an outright rejection. IG will never partially fill your order as an alternative to filling it in its entirety. So if you trade in a size so large that we cannot fill your entire order rather than reject your entire order IG will be able to fill you in the maximum size possible.
If you have selected the partial fill feature, the next time you trade through the same device it will be retained as your default option. It will, however, need to be activated independently on different devices e.g. going from your desktop trading platform to using your account through an app.
Are partial fills for me?
Partial fills may be for you if you are a client who wants as much of your order filled as possible at the current price, and do not want a size rejection just because IG cannot fill the entire order.
Example
IG’s current FTSE 100 Cash price is 6799/6800. You want to buy 100 standard lots (£10/pt) at 6800, but you are worried that your order may be size rejected as it is too big.
You submit an order to buy 100 standard lots at 6800, and select ‘accept partial fill’ on the deal ticket.
IG tries to fill you in the whole 100 lots, but as the order is so big you receive a partial fill in 75 lots. If you had not ‘accepted partial fill’ your entire order would have been rejected. The remaining part of your order (25 lots) will be cancelled.
Points through current
Points through current will give you even more control of your execution by allowing you to trade through the current IG price. This new feature will reduce your chance of a price rejection in volatile market conditions, and increase your likelihood of successful execution when you are trading in large sizes.
While IG will still fill your order at the best possible price, you can rest assured that, like partials, the chance of a successful execution is increased when using ‘points through current.
Is points through current for me?
Points through current may be for you if you are a client who wants to minimise the change of a price rejection due to volatile markets.
Example
IG’s current FTSE 100 Cash price is 6799/6800, but the market is very volatile and you want to reduce your chance of getting a price rejection when you buy 10 standard lots (£10/pt).
You submit an order to buy 10 standard lots of FTSE 100 Cash up to 2 points through current price. You are telling IG you are willing to pay up to 6802 (6800 + 2) to reduce your chance of a price rejection as you know the market is volatile.
When IG receives your order our FTSE 100 Cash price has gone down 1 point to 6798/6799 and you get filled in 10 standard lots at 6799.
How we source the best prices
We source our prices from a large number of venues to help us give you the best price we can:
- Our forex and some other market prices are sourced from top global banks and exchanges
- We make our own prices for markets such as out-of-hours indices
- We use primary exchanges like the ASX and our multi-venue technology to source shares prices from leading exchanges, including BATS and Chi-X Europe.
- This means you get greater liquidity and can access the best prices from around the globe, and it means we can continue to quote even if an exchange goes down
Which prices are live?
The majority of our prices are live for active clients.
For equity markets, we offer four different types of price feed:
- Delayed prices
15 or 20 minutes behind the exchange price. Free of charge
- Derived prices
Real-time prices created from the raw data of one or more exchanges. Free of charge
- Level 1
Real-time prices from the top level of the exchange order book. Charges may apply if you upgrade to this data feed - Level 2
Real time prices from the top five levels of the exchange order book. Charges may apply if you upgrade to this data feed
We display delayed prices by default on all equity markets, unless we can offer another free data option.
You can see raw exchange prices if you upgrade your data feeds or use our DMA platform. Upgrading does incur a fee from any exchange you subscribe to.
Please note that execution is always against the true exchange price, and will be at the best price that we can source.
You can get access to ProRealTime charts at no extra cost if you transact at least four times in a given month. However, if you don't meet this requirement, or your trading activity is of extremely low value, then a $40 per month fee will apply1.
How does it work?
When you are trading share CFDs and you click on one of the prices in our DMA platforms, the smart order routing technology immediately routes your order to the relevant venue. By routing your order across multiple order books it's more likely that your order will be filled, but you will only ever be charged one commission per order.
If your requested size and price is not available, your order will be routed to the primary exchange, where the greatest level of liquidity is generally available.
MTF lit books
Multilateral Trading Facilities (MTFs) provide visible order books in the same way primary exchanges do, so you can see the price and size of all orders and judge where you want to place yours. We combine these MTF lit books and the primary exchange order book to display a single, aggregated order book.
If you are using our L2 Dealer platform, you can view the individual order books for each exchange and MTF.
Dark pools
Our technology also connects you to the dark pools provided by MTFs like Delta or BATS Europe’s Dark Pool. These are orders not displayed on the lit books but are available for you to trade against. Dark liquidity pools are often used by institutional investors who do not wish to reveal the price, size and origin of their orders.
This means that as well as the liquidity visible on the lit order books, trading share CFDs with IG gives you access to the non-displayed liquidity found in the dark pools. This means you can take advantage of even greater levels of liquidity, increasing the likelihood of your orders being filled and the potential for better prices.
Better prices
Previously, MTF lit and dark liquidity was only available to large institutional investors; we enable all CFD traders to access these new venues through our DMA trading solutions.
Security
All our platforms use top-level web security, so you can trade with confidence.
We utilise 256-bit SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encryption, which is the industry standard for online financial transactions, from eBay to major banking institutions.
Open an account now
You might be interested in...
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Platforms and apps
Browser-based desktop trading and native apps for all devices.
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Automated trading
Your CFD trading strategies, our outstanding execution and pricing.
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Charting packages
Use IG charts, plus access advanced ProRealTime and Autochartist packages
1$40 monthly fee applies to ProRealTime access unless at least four trades are transacted in a given month. We reserve the right to charge you for the service if your qualifying trades are of an extremely low value.
Contact us
Questions about opening an account: +44 (20) 7633 5430 or email: sales.en@ig.com
Existing client questions:
+44 (20) 7633 5431 or email: helpdesk.en@ig.com
We’re here 24 hours a day, except from 6am to 4pm on Saturday (UTC+8).
