Immediate or Cancel Order (IOC)

What is Immediate or Cancel Order?

The term Immediate or Cancel order' is commonly used for a stock investment and the financial Industry. It can be defined as an order you receive to either purchase or sell the share that needs to be executed as soon as possible. You can purchase full or partial order, i.e., if the full order is unavailable for traders.

However, if you don’t purchase any part of the order instantly, then that will be canceled automatically. Many people confuse Immediate or Cancel order for all or none orders. It is important to note that the latter refers to the stocks that need to be purchased in full. The main benefit of the IOC is that it allows investors to make a quick purchase of the order. In fact, it happens to be one of the easiest ways to get securities, even when you are unable to purchase the full portion of the order.

Overview of the Immediate or Cancel Order

This method is mainly used by large investors who wants to place an order for large quantities of securities. Many investment platforms facilitate Immediate or Cancel orders. You can place these orders manually or set the automatic order trading – whichever fits your requirements. The IOC is available for purchase in two common forms. One, you get to place the 'limit' immediate or cancel an order, in which the selling price is fixed. Another one is the IOC Market order that allows investors to place a bid that fits their investment requirement. The order will be sold to the investor who places the best bid.

Automatic Order Cancellation

As mentioned before, you get an opportunity to purchase partial order when it comes to immediate or cancel the order. There is no denying that IOC orders are better than other types of order fulfillment methods. It gives users full flexibility to execute the order, however they want and purchase the order in their desired quantity. It speeds up the order execution process and mitigates the risk. Experts recommend immediate or cancel orders when you have a large order to place. The order that can’t be fulfilled immediately doesn’t need manual cancellation as it gets canceled automatically. Let’s say an investor places an order for 10,000 shares of a company. The shares that aren’t bought instantly will automatically be canceled. This strategy does wonders for the regular traders that trade shares 24x7.