Requote
Definition
A requote occurs when the broker cannot fill an order at the requested price (typically due to fast market movement) and offers a new price for confirmation. Requotes are common at retail market-maker brokers and during news events; they delay execution and can erode scalping edges. ECN/STP brokers typically execute or reject rather than requote.
In-depth: Requote
A requote occurs in the dealing-desk execution model when the broker cannot honour the original quote at order submission. Common scenarios: 1. Fast market movement during the order transit interval — by the time the broker's dealing desk receives the order, the original quoted price is no longer the market price 2. News-event volatility spreads widening or moving beyond the quoted spread 3. Low-liquidity windows (Asian session opening, rollover times) where quoted prices don't reflect tradeable liquidity 4. Dealing desk discretion at market-maker brokers who may reject orders that would be unprofitable for the broker to fill at the quoted price (a controversial practice but technically permitted in the dealing-desk model)
What happens during a requote: the broker's terminal displays the new price and waits for trader confirmation. For manual trading, this is a brief friction; for EAs, the behaviour depends on the EA's design — some EAs auto-accept any requote within a slippage tolerance, others reject all requotes (preserving the original signal logic), others retry repeatedly. In MetaTrader, the requote handling is controlled via the `Slippage` parameter and the `OrderSend` retry logic.
Impact on scalping EAs: catastrophic. Scalping edges depend on entry precision — a 5-pip requote on a 10-pip target eliminates 50% of expected profit. Scalpers should not run on requote-prone brokers.
Impact on trend-following / position EAs: minimal. A 5-pip requote on a 100-pip-target trade is a 5% efficiency loss, generally acceptable.
Broker model differences: - ECN brokers: typically no requotes. Orders either execute at the market price (with possible slippage) or reject. The 'no requotes' guarantee is a key selling point for ECN over dealing-desk brokers. - STP brokers: similar to ECN — orders pass through to liquidity providers, executing or rejecting without requote. - Dealing-desk (market-maker) brokers: requotes common, especially during volatile periods. Some brokers explicitly disclose 'no requotes during news'; others have unpredictable requote behaviour.
Detection: monitor your EA's order rejection log for `TRADE_RETCODE_REQUOTE` (10004 in MT5) events. A high frequency indicates broker-model mismatch for the strategy.