Requote

What a requote means

A requote happens when you try to trade at a price shown on your screen and the broker replies that this price is no longer available, offering a new price for you to accept or reject. The order does not fill automatically at the new level. Instead you must decide again, usually within a few seconds.

Requotes are most closely associated with dealing desk and market maker execution models, where the broker's system checks the price against its own feed before confirming. They are less common with fully automated market execution, where orders fill at the best available price, with slippage, rather than being sent back for approval.

Traders usually see a requote as a small pop-up in the platform showing the old price and the new one. The experience is irritating in fast moves, because by the time you accept, the price may have moved again.

How it works

The sequence is straightforward.

1. You see a price on your platform and click to buy or sell.
2. Your order travels over the internet to the broker's server, which takes a little time, called latency.
3. During that interval, the market price may change.
4. If the price on the server differs from the one in your order by more than the broker allows, the server rejects the instruction and sends back the current price.
5. You choose whether to accept the new price, which sends another order, or to decline.

Two order execution styles matter here. With instant execution, the order is filled at the requested price or the client gets a requote. With market execution, the order is filled at the best available price whatever it is, so there is no requote but the fill can differ from the screen price.

Many platforms allow a maximum deviation setting, sometimes called slippage tolerance. If the price moves within the tolerance, the order fills anyway. If it moves outside, you receive a requote or a rejection.

Causes include fast markets around news, thin liquidity, slow internet connections, distant servers and sometimes overloaded broker systems.

A worked example

The figures are illustrative. A trader wants to buy 1 standard lot of EUR/USD, which is 100,000 euros, and sees an ask of 1.0850.

1. They click buy at 1.0850. A central bank headline arrives in the same second.
2. The broker's server price is now 1.0854 and the deviation allowed is 1 pip, which is 0.0001.
3. The difference is 4 pips, so the order is not filled and a requote of 1.0854 is sent.
4. At 10 US dollars per pip for a standard lot, accepting the new price costs 4 × 10 = 40 US dollars more than the first price would have, before the trade even moves.
5. If the trader waits and the price moves to 1.0860, the next request may be requoted again.

With a deviation allowance of 5 pips the order would have filled at 1.0854 straight away, and the 40-dollar difference would be called slippage.

Why it matters

Requotes affect how reliably you can enter or exit a position. In fast markets, repeated requotes can stop you from closing a losing trade or from getting into a planned entry, and they can be costly when a stop or target is close.

They are also an indicator of execution quality. Frequent requotes in normal conditions may point to slow infrastructure, a broker's last-look practices or a dealing desk model. Occasional ones in extreme volatility are common across the industry.

Regulators in many jurisdictions require firms to have best execution policies. The way a broker handles price changes is part of that, and should be described in its order execution policy.

How to use it in practice

• Read the broker's order execution policy for how price changes are handled.
• Test the platform on a demo account, though demo conditions may differ from live.
• Set the maximum deviation to a level that balances fill probability with price control.
• Avoid placing market orders during major scheduled news if that is not your plan.
• Use limit orders when price matters more than certainty of fill.
• Check your internet connection and consider a server closer to the broker if you trade fast.
• Keep screenshots and timestamps of repeated requotes in case you need to raise a complaint.

Common mistakes and misconceptions

• Believing that requotes are always a broker trick. Often they reflect real market movement and latency.
• Treating requotes and slippage as the same thing. A requote asks for approval, while slippage fills at a different price automatically.
• Setting a very wide deviation just to avoid requotes, which can lead to bad fills.
• Assuming all execution models behave the same way.
• Not reading the policy and discovering the rules only during a volatile move.

Risks and limitations

Repeated requotes or large slippage can make leveraged positions more difficult to manage, and losses can accumulate quickly in fast moves. Execution behaviour differs by broker, platform and market condition, and no setting can remove price risk. This article is educational and not a recommendation.

How Brokeli looks at it

In broker research we note the execution model, whether instant or market execution is offered, the stated policy on price deviation and any published information on order rejection. This goes into the published research snapshot, so comparisons of execution quality are based on stated, checkable facts and not on marketing claims.