I’ve been out walking and enjoying the sunshine today rather than trading or writing, and when I got home I was keen to review and adjust my stop orders so as to lock in more of the profits on of today’s rising positions. Except that I couldn’t, because for the most part my stop orders are all guaranteed now, and you can’t move guaranteed stop orders when markets are closed.
It’s one of the prices you pay for the guarantees, along with paying a fee or suffering a wider spread and accepting a wider-than-usual minimum stop distance. On the other hand, what you get in return is the reduced risk that you will get stopped-out at an unfavourable price due to slippage, the reduced chance of placing your stop too tight (because of the wider minimum stop distance), and the benefit of additional freed-up trading funds with a guaranteed stop order.
On balance, I am once more a fan of using guaranteed stop orders in accounts like the IG Index and SpreadEx spread betting accounts that allow them. And even more of a fan of using guaranteed stop orders in the Capital Spreads and InterTrader accounts that allow you to apply the guarantees retrospectively on existing trades.
I admit that guaranteed stop orders may not be so useful for those part-time traders who must review and adjust their stop orders out-of-hours at evenings and weekends, and in those cases you will have to rely on the non-guaranteed stop orders provided by all of the spread betting companies.
Disclaimer: this posting is for general education only; it is not trading advice.