Whilst idly watching my screen yesterday evening I noticed that my position on AUDNZD was moving slowly against me and was getting close to my stop. Nothing unusual in that, I think to myself, my stop is there for reason and if it gets hit I learn a small lesson and move on to the next idea.
But then quite unexpectedly the stop is breached and the position is closed. What the...??? I can see quite clearly that the price has not suddenly jumped through my stop yet it has been triggered nonetheless!
Then I look at the spread - to my surprise it is now a whopping 20 points! I next look at the clock - it is 10pm exactly. And as we all know, this is a significant time when holding overnight positions.
You can guess what happens next, of course. After a short time the spread closes up again and the price reverses and begins to drift away.
Out of curiosity, I now check my Account Transactions - not only was I stopped, I was also slipped 0.8 points! And to rub salt in the wound I was charged "Daily FX Interest for 4 days AUD/NZD". I don't know why it states 4 days - the position was only open for a matter of hours (Perhaps IG can explain this.)
Now, I don't trade large positions and I use sensible stops so it's not exactly a financial disaster. But come on IG - this game is hard enough without you pulling stunts like this on your clients. Would it not be possible for you to maintain the spread that a position was entered upon throughout it's duration? This would not only prevent the above occurring but also remove the worry of being spread-stopped when deciding to hold overnight.
I would also be interested to know if this was a freak occurrence or whether it has happened to other users.
Mac