Providing or taking liquidity: choosing your side

On every trade, you choose a role, and that choice weighs as much as direction.

The desk rule

Passive to enter where there is a reason to be patient; aggressive so as not to be left behind on a strong signal. And always: get out fast when the thesis is invalidated (the scratch), whatever the entry mode.

Execution cost, in numbers

On the NQ, the spread is one tick, $5. Entering and exiting aggressively therefore costs 2 ticks, $10 per contract, plus any slippage. On a trade targeting 15 points ($300) with a 6-point stop ($120), that is 8% of the risk. Not nothing, but it is the price of certainty. On a scalp targeting 3 points ($60), it is 17% of the target: execution cost decides whether the strategy is profitable or not.