Selling all your stock on one order? Commissions?

Question

Let's say I own 2,500 shares of XYZ stock. I place a limit order to sell all 2,500 shares at $30.00 per share. The bid price hits $30.00, but my broker only finds a bid for 1,250 shares at that price. If I do NOT have AON on my order, will the broker sell the 1,250 shares, charge me the commission and leave me holding 1,250 shares to try and sell again? How does this work?

Answer 1

Ultimately, you would need to check with your broker's policy on partially filled limit orders, but the brokers I'm familiar with will charge you only one commission if it is filled within the same market trading day.  For example, if the first half fills in the morning, and the second half fills in the afternoon, you're charged only one commission.  However, if you have a good 'till canceled order in place and you get a fill one day, another fill on a second day, and yet another fill on a third day, then you are charged a total of THREE commissions(because it would filled on 3 separate days).

Answer 2

If you do not have the AON qualifier on your order, your brokerage firm is legally obligate to sell any part of your order at the price you set if the bid matches your order.

Commissions are usually charged on the order IF the order is executed on the same day, if not you will be charged another commission on each part thereafter.

However, if you are a good customer of a full service brokerage firm, they can, and often do pro rate subsequent transactions, but they are not obligated to do so.

Answer 3

Usually, they'll charge their per order rate for the entire quantity even if it's purchased by several different buys at different times.  Thus, you'd pay the total commission only once for the entire order.

One other thing, if you were offering 2500 shares at $30, then the market was never 30.00 bid.  Someone may have bought from your offer but if the market was truly 30.00 bid then your entire order would have been filled.  Rather it was offered at 30.00 by you not 30.00 bid.