Stock Market Quotes Explanation

There are a few different types of stock market quotes that can be used when buying or selling a stock in the stock market.

Stock trading online is easy. Here's what to expect when you buy stocks online:

First you log into your stock brokers firm's website, such as , over a secure internet connection. Your stock broker will have given you a user ID and a password.

Next you enter the ticker symbol of the stock you want to buy. Ticker symbols are a holdover from the long-ago days when trades were reported by telegraph. They are a kind of shorthand for the stock's name.

For example General Electric is - not surprisingly - GE. Microsoft is MSFT.

You must then indicate if you want to buy or sell the stock. Usually there is a box to check or a pull down menu. You may also have the option to Sell Short or Buy to Cover - which refers to closing out a short sale you've already done.

Short Selling is a big topic of its own.

Next you enter the price.

There are several different types of stock orders that you can use for placing the stock order, for which you want to buy or sell:

• Market orders - ensure that your stock trade is executed, but do not guarantee any specific price. When you place an order to buy or sell 'at the market' your . stock broker is obligated to execute your order immediately at the best price available.

  Usually this means you will buy at the current ask price and sell at the bid price. If your order is placed when the market is closed, you will generally get the opening price the next day the market is open.
  
  

• Stock Limit orders - allow you to decide what price you want when you buy or sell a stock, but your stock order may not be executed if the market does not trade through your price. You specify a price below the current market value when you are buying or above it when you are selling.
  
  
• Stop Loss orders - help you limit your losses. If you are worried about a big drop in the price of a stock you own, you can place a sell stop order below the current market price. If the stock trades at or below your stop price, your order becomes a market order to sell the stock immediately. Visa Versa when selling short.

Choose your time frame. If your order is a limit order or a stop order, you may make the order good for one day only or good until you cancel it (GTC). Market orders are automatically day orders since they will be executed immediately.

Once these items are all entered, the system will display the order for you to confirm that this order, and your other orders are the types of stock market quotes and orders that you wanted.

You hit enter and your order goes off for execution. If the market is open, and you placed a market order, you will usually get a trade execution immediately.

If you have entered a limit or stop order, the firm will usually send you an email when it is executed.

Now, a couple of scenarios may happen after you place your order, such as:

• Unfilled Orders - Due to the above mentioned ranking order, and the often light volume of shares trading, you may not always get your order filled.

  You may put in an order to buy at certain stock market quotes, and find that the shares did not trade at that price during the duration of your order, and therefore you did not make the transaction.

• Partial Fills - You may also find that you got your order partially filled. You may want 8000 shares of a stock, but only get 3000. This is because only 3000 shares were available at the price you had requested.

  This applies to both buying and selling. If you see that this may be the case mid-day, you can respond by adjusting the price of your order to ensure you trade all the shares you want. You will not get an extra commission for that.

  However, if your order goes for several days and is partly filled on more than one day, you will get a commission charge from your broker each day you trade shares.

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