A stop order (also: stop market order) is dormant until price touches a configured trigger, at which point it converts to a market order and fills at whatever the book offers. It is the standard implementation of a stop loss when guaranteed execution matters more than guaranteed price.
Buy stops sit above the current price, sell stops below. Stop orders can be used both for protective stop losses (sell stop below a long) and for breakout entries (buy stop above resistance).
Because the order converts to market, fills in fast markets can slip well past the trigger. In gappy markets a stop can fill far from its intended level — this is the price paid for guaranteed execution.
Example
Long at 50,000. Place a sell stop at 49,500. If price trades down to 49,500 the stop triggers and a market sell fires — actual fill could be 49,495 or 49,470 depending on the book.
How Noon Barbari uses Stop order
Every concept here is implemented in the platform. Open the relevant docs or tool to see it in action.
Order types in the designer →Related terms
- Order types
Stop-limit order
Stop order that converts to a limit order, not a market — avoids bad slippage.
- Risk
Stop loss
A pre-committed exit level that caps the maximum loss on a trade.
- Order types
Market order
An order to fill immediately at the best available price. Pays the spread.
- Backtesting
Slippage
Difference between the price a strategy assumed and the price it actually got.