Confusion when adding/selling partials in an open position

[Moraha]

I'm going to have a difficult time explaining this but hopefully you can understand what my problem is.

Today, I had a long position of 10 contracts of MNQ using an ATM strategy. As the position went up, I sold 5 manually on the Chart Trader. I simply changed the Order Qty to 5 and hit Sell Mkt. When I did that, it sold the 5 contracts position, but it opened a new Stop MKT order on my chart a few points above and below the current price level. If the price hit that level, it would open a short of 5 contracts. In the past, when I hit Sell while in an open position, it would simply sell the 5 and my existing position would just show 5 remaining contracts...no new position on the screen.

Can anybody tell me how to fix this issue? I simply want to scale in and out and not have any new orders on my chart.

[NinjaTrader_Spencer]

Hello Moraha,

Thank you for your post.

You would want to change the ATM Strategy dropdown menu to 'None' so that when you scale out another ATM Strategy is not initiated.

[Moraha]

Hello Moraha,

Thank you for your post.

You would want to change the ATM Strategy dropdown menu to 'None' so that when you scale out another ATM Strategy is not initiated.

Hi Spencer. I somehow missed this response but I have another issue that I think is appropriate to add to this thread.

I noticed that when selling partials even with or without using an ATM Strategy, my Entry line (not sure what it's called exactly...it's the line on the chart that shows my current position) moves properly when adding a position, but seems to be incorrect when selling partials later on.

For example, if I am going long 2 contracts at 5,000 on ES and it goes up to 5,005 and I add 2 more to my position, my entry line then moves to 5,002.5 because adding to the position moved my average up, so that makes sense. Then it goes up 10 more points to 5,015, I decide to sell 2 of those contracts. When I hit sell, the line showing my current position moves up some points. Why would my entry move up if all I'm doing is selling some of my current position? Shouldn't it remain the same?

This happened yesterday when I wanted to leave runners. It forced me to sell the runners early because my "break even" line all of a sudden moved way up after I sold 10 out of my 15 contracts on MNQ.

[NinjaTrader_Sev]

Hello Moraha,

Thank you for the inquiry.

This is to be expected, since ATM Strategies will always average out all total entry prices. When selling some of your current positions, you are removing their entry prices from the total that is being averaged out. For example:

You have 4 orders, and the entry prices are 5000, 5000, 5005, 5005 = 20010/4 = 5002.5
Then you sell 2 contracts and the first 2 "5000" entry prices are gone because of FIFO (First In First Out, more information at this link)
So the average entry would go to 5005

This is a preconfigured feature of NinjaTrader 8 and cannot be turned off at this time.

Please let us know if we can be of further assistance!

[Moraha]

Hello Moraha,

Thank you for the inquiry.

This is to be expected, since ATM Strategies will always average out all total entry prices. When selling some of your current positions, you are removing their entry prices from the total that is being averaged out. For example:

You have 4 orders, and the entry prices are 5000, 5000, 5005, 5005 = 20010/4 = 5002.5
Then you sell 2 contracts and the first 2 "5000" entry prices are gone because of FIFO (First In First Out, more information at this link)
So the average entry would go to 5005

This is a preconfigured feature of NinjaTrader 8 and cannot be turned off at this time.

Please let us know if we can be of further assistance!

I had a very difficult time wrapping my head around this so I sat down and did some hypothetical scale in and outs and see that the end result is the same. However, it's very confusing the way Ninjatrader displays this. Other platforms leave the average line fixed but Ninjatrader does not when scaling out. I came across this video that says you can enable or disable how it's displayed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRTRsVYD6cQ

But I do not see that option in my Ninjatrader. Was this option removed? Are there any add-ons that would allow me to change this?

It makes way way more sense to know where my actual break even line is if the original entry stayed fix. I typically leave a runner and set my stop to break even, but with NT it looks like I have to mark where my average line is after scaling out so I can set that level as my break even, even though it has moved after I sold some partials. That is very annoying.

[NinjaTrader_Sev]

Hello Moraha,

Thanks for the note.

The scaling in / scaling out in the video does still work, but please note that the average entry price is still going to average out. This is a preconfigured feature of NinjaTrader 8 and cannot be shut off.
If you have 'Select Active ATM strategy on order submission' for 'ATM strategy selection mode' selected, it will combine ATM orders when you scale in. The ATM orders of the 2nd entry orders are combined with the existing ATM orders of the first entry order.

If you don't want ATM orders to be combined, but you want to submit them as configured, please set 'ATM strategy selection mode' to 'Keep selected ATM strategy template on order submission'. That way ATM orders are not combined. The 2nd set of ATM orders are submitted based on the entry price of the 2nd entry order, not on the average entry price. Please be advised that while the stop loss and profit target would now be left separate, the entry price is still going to be averaged out; unfortunately there is not way to change this.

More information on ATM Strategy selection mode can be found here.

Let us know if you require further support.