Trading -> Live Monitoring
Every trader who has a position open right now, priced on every tick. The screen answers three questions: who is about to hit a limit, what the firm is exposed to while they do, and what to do about it.
You need the view_monitoring permission to open the screen and
manage_monitoring to close positions or cancel pending orders. Without it
those actions are not offered anywhere on the screen. Opening an account in
Trading accounts needs view_accounts,
and opening the trader needs view_traders.
The floor
The screen opens on the floor alone, across its whole width. Its head says whether it is live, how many accounts and positions are on it and what they float together, per currency. When the live connection drops it says Offline since and the time, because positions opened or closed after that only show once it is back. Two counts follow when they are not zero: accounts near a limit and accounts with a low margin level. Each also names the ones that need a look first, accounts with less than 10% of a limit left and accounts below 100% margin level. Clicking either count narrows the floor to it.
A symbol that has had no live price for ten seconds is named under the head, with the note that its P&L is the last one the server sent. Ten seconds, because prices arrive as they trade and a quiet instrument has not ticked yet right after the page opens.
The floor reads three ways, picked above it:
| View | One row per | What a row shows |
|---|---|---|
| Accounts | Account | The trader, the status, the account number and challenge, the equity, the margin level with the margin in use, the positions and pending orders, the floating P&L, and the room left on its tightest loss limit |
| Positions | Position | The symbol, side and lots, whose it is, the price now and the open price, stop loss and take profit, how long it has been open, and its P&L |
| Symbols | Instrument | The long and short lots across the floor, what they net to, how many positions in how many accounts, and the floating P&L per currency |
Columns drop off from the right as the screen narrows. Clicking a symbol shows the positions in it. Right-clicking a row opens its menu: open the account beside the floor, in Trading accounts or its trader, narrow the floor to it, copy its number, the trader's email, its id, a link or a ticket, and the actions under Stepping in.
The floor shows fifty rows to a page. Each view sorts one way per column, the way somebody reads it first. Accounts start on least room left, and also sort by deepest loss, most equity, lowest margin level, most positions or trader. Positions start on deepest loss, and also sort by largest, longest open, symbol or trader. Symbols start on most lots, and also sort by largest net exposure, deepest loss or name. The filter menu and the column heads sort the same.
While the pointer is over the rows, a menu is open or J and K are walking them, the rows keep their places even when prices move, so the row you are about to click does not slide away. Their numbers keep moving. Three seconds after the last J or K the floor sorts again.
Search and filters
Search matches the trader's name and email, the account number, the challenge
and phase, the symbol, the instrument name and the ticket. Several words narrow
further: every one of them has to match. Start a word with # to look only at
account numbers and tickets, so #1042 does not also find a trader whose email
contains those digits. Press / anywhere on the screen to jump to the search
box and Esc to clear it.
| Filter | What it narrows to |
|---|---|
| Status | Active accounts, still in evaluation, or funded ones |
| Side | Buy or sell positions |
| P&L | Winning or losing |
| Challenge | One or more challenges, picked from the ones on screen |
| Symbol | One or more instruments, picked from the ones on screen |
| Near a limit | Less than a quarter of a loss limit left |
| Low margin | Accounts whose margin level is under 200% |
The search, filters, view, sort and page live in the address bar, so a view can be bookmarked or sent to a colleague and opens exactly as you left it.
Room to the limit
For each account the screen works out the equity at which its daily loss limit and its maximum loss limit are hit, using the same reference points the risk engine measures from. The room left is the live equity minus that level, shown as an amount and a bar on the tighter of the two. Hovering over it shows both. The bar turns red once less than a tenth is left, and the amount once the limit is crossed. An account whose phase sets no loss limit shows No limit.
The margin level turns red below 100%, where a margin call starts. A level above 1,000% shows as Over 1,000%: past that point it only says the positions are small next to the account.
An account
Picking an account, or a position, folds the floor to a column on the left and slides the account in beside it. The cross in the corner or Escape folds it away and gives the floor its width back, with the same search, filters and page. J and K move through the rows and Enter opens the one they rest on. Once an account is open, J and K show each account they rest on.
Every account has its own address, /admin/monitoring/acct_..., and the tab
you have open is part of it.
The head of an account names its challenge, size and phase and the trader it belongs to, and says when that trader cannot sign in, was deleted, is on your team, is restricted by fraud detection or has open flags. Under it are the notes a colleague pinned on the account in Trading accounts. Then the figures that move with every tick: the equity with the balance, the floating P&L, the margin level with the free margin, the room left on the daily and the maximum loss limit, and what the account closed today.
| Tab | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Positions | Every open position valued at the price it would close at, with your spread on top, its stops and how long it has been open |
| Orders | The pending orders: buy or sell, limit or stop, the price they wait for, their stops, when they were placed and when they expire. Read again every ten seconds while the tab is open, because pending orders are not on the live connection |
| Today | The trades closed since the risk engine's day began, newest first and up to 200, with why each closed and what it made after commission. The day starts at midnight on the server's clock, when the daily loss limit starts over, and the tab says when that was in your own time |
The menu in the head opens the account in Trading accounts or the trader, narrows the floor to the account, and copies its number, the trader's email, its id or a link to it.
Stepping in
Every action asks for confirmation first. A close acts at the current market price.
- Close on a position closes it whole.
- Close part asks how many lots. It has to be at least the instrument's smallest lot and a whole number of its lot steps, and what stays open has to be at least the smallest lot as well, so a position of one smallest lot can only close whole. The dialog shows what stays open and what the closed part makes at the live price. The rest keeps its ticket, and the part that closed becomes a closed trade of its own.
- Close all positions closes everything on the account and checks the account against its rules once at the end. Pending orders stay in place, and the confirmation says how many there are.
- Cancel on a pending order, or Cancel pending orders for all of them, takes them away so they cannot fill. Open positions stay as they are.
The trader gets a notification for each of these, saying risk management did it, and their journal names risk management as the reason a trade closed. Every action is in the activity log with who did it. When the position closed by itself while the confirmation was open, the screen says it was already closed. When a pending order filled first, it says the order could not be cancelled and that its position is open now.
In the older designs
Propper - OG and Tactical keep the classic screen: one table with an accounts and a positions view, a side panel with what needs attention, the accounts closest to a limit and the net lots per symbol, and closing a position or a whole account from the right-click menus. The Symbols view, an account beside the floor with its pending orders and today's trades, closing part of a position and cancelling pending orders are only in the standard design. A link to an account on this screen opens the classic floor searched for that account's number.