TradeStation expert pack for AI agents

Load this into Grok Bot. You can also load it into Claude (as Project knowledge or CLAUDE.md) or a custom GPT. It turns the agent into someone who has already made the TradeStation mistakes, so your agent does not have to. It covers the official TradeStation MCP and the v3 REST API.

These are the lessons and traps. The reference material is in TradeStation's docs (links at the end).

Where each note comes from:

• Untagged: seen on TradeStation's simulator in October 2026.
• [field]: learned in earlier real sessions.
• [docs]: from TradeStation's docs, not re-tested.

Unofficial; no business relationship with TradeStation. Not financial advice. Automated trading can lose money. If this is more than 30 days old, re-check the docs.

Last checked 2026-10-19. Re-check by 2026-11-18.

How an expert works

1. The operator picks the trade. You carry it out.
   • A plan names the symbol, side, size, order type, price, duration and max loss. A missing field means no send. Never invent a size. No signals.
   • The operator can approve a rule once ("buy 1 at 09:35, sell at 15:55") and you repeat it on the simulator. You still never choose the symbol, side or size.
2. Use the simulator until the operator turns live trading on. Then rehearse each new order shape on the simulator first.
3. Respect the desk limits: max quantity, max notional, orders per day, open positions. Until the operator sets them, send 1 share or 1 contract, one symbol at a time. You can't raise a limit yourself.
4. Your checks come first. Then confirm, place and verify. TradeStation's confirm is not a safety net (see below).
5. Read the position before every buy or sell, and again after the fill.
6. Read a real clock (US Eastern) before choosing the order type and duration. The session decides both.
7. If it isn't known, stop and say so. Never invent an endpoint, field, account id, fill or rule.
8. Never print or ask for tokens, client secrets, auth codes or passwords. If one gets pasted into the chat, tell the operator to revoke it.
9. The kill word is STOP. Cancel your working orders and end the session.

First-hour traps

Getting access

• MCP access: the operator requests it on the Platforms page of TradeStation's HUB, then connects it in Claude or ChatGPT with OAuth. The server URL is https://mcp.tradestation.com/v2/mcp. In Claude Code: claude mcp add --transport http tradestation https://mcp.tradestation.com/v2/mcp.
• Plan, balance, and the Claude steps, including the TradeStation pages that disagree, are on Connect TradeStation to Claude. This pack stays on the order rules and the traps.
• API access needs a funded TradeStation account.
  • The API FAQ says to request a key by email to ClientExperience@tradestation.com.
  • The trading-API page listed a promo code and a $10,000 minimum when checked in October 2026. [docs] Read both pages for current terms.
  • There's no separate simulator sign-up: the simulator is the same API on sim-api.tradestation.com.
• www.tradestation.com blocks bots. Its pages (MCP setup, API signup, FAQs) return 403 to non-browser fetchers. Ask the operator to open them.

MCP environment

• The MCP starts on live. get-trading-environment read live on a fresh connection. Before any account call, run set-trading-environment with sim (lowercase), read it back, and stop if the read-back isn't sim.
• place-order has its own environment switch. It's separate from the global setting, so always pass environment: "SIM" (uppercase there).
• MCP market data comes from live, even when trading is set to sim. Quotes report environment: live. That's fine for reading; orders still go to sim.

Sign-in and tokens (API)

• The Trade permission has to be granted at sign-in.
  • A token was issued without it, and refreshing didn't add it. Only a new browser consent fixes it. [field]
  • If you build the authorize URL yourself, check that Trade is in the scope list. One kept leaving it out. [field]
  • A refresh response that lists only openid offline_access is normal; it doesn't mean Trade was dropped. [docs]
  • The MCP has no way to show permissions; the first confirm or place tells you.
• Token lifetimes:
  • Access tokens last 20 minutes. Refresh about 10 minutes before a session and right before any burst of orders, not at the moment you need the order. [field]
  • On a 401, refresh once and retry once, then stop.
  • Refresh tokens don't expire by default. If a refresh returns a new refresh_token, rotation is on: store the new one. [docs]
• /oauth/revoke revokes every refresh token for the API key, not just the one you pass. [docs]

Accounts and the clock

• Match the account to the asset. Margin or Cash for stocks and options, Futures for futures. A mismatch fails with Invalid account for the asset type. Never type an account id from memory; read it from the accounts call each session.
• Simulator accounts are shared. They can hold other sessions' positions and orders. Trade a symbol you have no position in, and never touch anything you didn't place.
• On Windows the shell clock can lie. Git Bash's TZ=America/New_York date printed UTC. Use Python zoneinfo (Windows may need pip install tzdata).

MCP or API?

Rule of thumb: explore and run supervised simulator sessions on the MCP. Use the API for automated rules, attached stop-losses or targets, and anything that streams.

Order type and duration: the part everyone gets wrong

Stocks

• Regular session (09:30–16:00 ET): any order type works. Default to DAY.
• Pre-market (06:00–09:30) and post-market (16:00–20:00): Limit only, with DYP (Day+). For several days, use GCP or GDP.
• Never send DAY outside the regular session. A pre-market DAY is accepted, then sits inactive until 09:30: a silent miss. [docs] After 16:00, DAY is rejected with No Day orders after 4:00PM Eastern. [field]
• Don't send DYP for a normal regular-session order. It keeps working into the post-market. An early-session order went out as DYP by mistake. [field]
• Stops don't protect you outside the regular session. Extended hours take limits only, so an exit there is a Limit with DYP. [field]
• Closed (overnight, weekends): nothing executes. Queue a Limit with GTC/GTD (wakes at 09:30) or GCP/GDP (wakes at 06:00).

Equity options

• Durations: DAY, GTC, GTD, IOC, FOK, OPG. Never CLO or the minute durations; both are rejected with Invalid duration.
• Plus durations (DYP/GCP/GDP) only on the select list. TradeStation's extended-hours options page says customers need Day+, GTC+, or GTD+, and the list will be updated twice a year. docs

SPY QQQ IWM GLD XLF NVDA TSLA AAPL MU INTC META AMZN AMD MSFT GOOGL PLTR ORCL AVGO NFLX HOOD GOOG SNDK BAC MRVL BABA TSM NOK F PFE

Confirm also accepts them on other names. Don't send those. Cboe FAQ Q3 says an extended-session order on a class that is not eligible will not be rejected. C1 accepts it, treats it as regular-hours only, ignores the extended-hours designation, and the order rests until 09:30 ET. docs Even on select names, whether a plus-duration order works once placed is unproven.

• IOC/FOK work until 16:17 ET. [docs] Options do not use the stock post-market that runs to 20:00. Select names do have a limit-only window from 16:00 to 16:15 ET.
• Select names are limit-only from 07:30 to 09:25 ET and from 16:00 to 16:15 ET. docs docs

Index options (SPX, SPXW, VIX, VIXW, XSP, RUT, RUTW)

• The same durations as equity options, with no plus durations. [docs]
• TradeStation's extended-hours options page lists an early GTH session from 07:15 to 09:25 ET, then a five-minute pause, a regular session from 09:30 to 16:15 ET, and a curb session from 16:15 to 17:00 ET. docs
• Don't send outside 09:30 to 16:15. The GTH and curb windows were not tested.

Futures

• Only DAY, GTC, GTD, IOC, FOK. Everything else is rejected.
• Only tested 09:30–16:00 ET on weekdays. The overnight session and the daily maintenance break aren't documented in the sources, so outside those hours, stop and ask.

Order types: Market, Limit, StopMarket, StopLimit.

• Never Stop. The MCP offers it, but TradeStation rejects it (Not a valid order confirm object).
• Send Market only when the plan says Market, and only in the regular session. A market order leaves no bid, ask or size to check on the receipt. [field]
• A trailing stop is StopMarket plus advancedOptions.trailingStop (an amount or a percent). A standalone one also needs a stopPrice. [docs] Not tested on the simulator.

Changing an order:

• A replace can change only: price, stop, quantity, trailing amount, or the type to Market.
• You can't change the duration with a replace. Cancel and send a new order.
• GTD/GDP need an expiration no more than 90 days out. TradeStation won't stop you from sending more.
• GTC orders:
  • They're resubmitted every day, so they lose time priority. [docs]
  • If one partly fills, the rest is cancelled at the end of the session. [docs]
• Holidays and early closes aren't handled anywhere. Confirm, and read the errors.

Confirm is not a safety net

TradeStation's confirm (MCP confirm-order, API orderconfirm) accepted every one of these:

What confirm does catch:

• a duration the asset never takes (Invalid duration)
• the wrong account type (Invalid account for the asset type)
• Stop (Not a valid order confirm object)

A confirm can also succeed while its built-in quote or balance lookup fails (Service Unavailable, NotEntitled, Symbol not found). Treat that confirm as having no quote, and pull a fresh quote yourself.

Don't double-send

• A retry after a timeout can place the same order twice. Before resending, check open orders and today's orders, and check your own log for the same order in the last 15 minutes. [field]
• On the API, OrderConfirmID (1–22 characters) is the server's dedupe key. Build it from the order's details plus the current clock minute (for example, a hash cut to 22 characters), so a retry in the same minute is rejected as a duplicate. [field]
• On the MCP, each confirm id places once (valid for 60 minutes). Don't add a second key.

Buying and selling without flipping your position

• Read the position first. On the MCP use get-positions-details with accounts and symbols: about 200 characters. Not get-positions-summary: about 16,000.
• SELLSHORT opens a short. It never closes a long. SELL with no long is not a close.
• Futures use BUY/SELL for everything, so know whether you're opening or closing.
• After the fill, check the order's leg. It says openOrClose: Open or Close. A close must come back Close, and the position must be flat, not flipped. In testing, every close and cover came back Close and flat.
• Before shorting:
  • A Cash account can't short. [docs]
  • Check hard-to-borrow and the account's IsStockLocateEligible. MCP quotes have no IsHardToBorrow field, so on the MCP tell the operator you can't check it.
  • A rejected short stops the session; don't retry larger.
• Close test positions in the same session. A leftover simulator fill is a real position on that account until you close it. [field]

Prices, ticks and combos

• Ticks:
  • Stocks move in 0.01.
  • ES futures move in 0.25, and one tick is $12.50.
  • The quote's MinMove ("25" for ES) is not the tick.
  • The API has symbol details (PriceFormat.Increment). The MCP has no symbol-details tool, so for any other product say the tick is unknown and rely on the price check in summaryMessage.
• Multiplier is the quote's PointValue: equity option 100, ES 50, stock 1. Don't assume 100.
• Futures confirm numbers mislead:
  • estimatedCost is the initial margin, not the contract's full value.
  • On a market order, estimatedPrice was about 20 points off the ask. Don't treat it as the fill.
• Multi-leg combos:
  • Send a combo as ONE order with legs. Never as separate single-leg orders: a three-leg position was once opened as three separate orders and left exposed in between. [field]
  • Price it before you send. [field]
    • Conservative net = the buy legs' asks minus the sell legs' bids. Mid = the same calculation on mid prices.
    • Don't send if any leg has a missing or zero bid or ask.
    • Don't send more contracts than the thinnest leg shows in size.
  • A negative limit is a credit. -1.00 came back as "Vertical @ -1.00", with an estimated cost of −100.
  • Read summaryMessage. It lists every leg. On the MCP, the orderDefinition echo comes back blank for combos.
  • A stock leg inside a combo uses BUYTOOPEN/SELLTOOPEN, not BUY/SELL.
  • Combos need the OptionSpreads permission and option approval level 3+.
• Don't trust a quote that is:
  • Delayed. The ES quote on a default simulator login was 10 minutes old.
  • Halted or restricted.
  • NotEntitled.

The flags sit in different places by path. MCP: top-level IsDelayed, Halted, Restrictions. API: MarketFlags.IsDelayed, IsHalted, and Restrictions.

Also sanity-check the numbers: one quote briefly showed a 52-week high below the current price.

Keep the quote's TradeTime (UTC), bid and ask with every order, as the price you acted on.

• Data limits:
  • Greeks aren't on the regular quote. [field] On the MCP use get-option-chain-snapshot or get-option-quotes.
  • MCP get-bars returns at most 100 bars, and its only intraday size is 5 minutes.

Reading what happened (the MCP is not the API)

• place-order says orderStatus: "UNKNOWN". That isn't a status.
  • Poll get-orders-detailed (by account and symbol, matching orderId). The real status showed on the first poll, about 5 seconds later.
  • Poll every 4–5 seconds a handful of times, never in a tight loop.
  • If more than 10 orders match, the tool returns a summary instead of details, so add filters.
• MCP order records use different fields from the API docs:
  • MCP: orderId, status, filledPrice, rootQuantityRemaining, and legs with buyOrSell, openOrClose, quantityRemaining, and symbol.name. There is no per-leg fill price.
  • API: OrderID, Status, FilledPrice, and legs with ExecQuantity/ExecutionPrice.
• What the statuses mean:

| Code | Meaning | |---|---| | ACK | Received and working | | FLL | Filled. On the simulator, at the market price, which can beat your limit | | OUT (UROut) | Cancelled. A cancel shows OUT, not CAN [field] | | REJ | Rejected. Read StatusDescription; don't resend the same order | | BRO | Broken. Still open, not done | | FLP | Partial fill, rest cancelled. Final | | FPR | Partial fill, still working |

• The MCP's CXL ("cancelled") filter misses OUT orders. To find cancels, read without a status filter.
• A price replace keeps the same order id. The response is "Cancel/Replace order sent."
• A run of unexplained OUT or REJ statuses has happened before. [field] Report it. Don't invent a cause.
• Yesterday's order id returns 404 on the today's-orders call. Use historical orders. [field]
• The simulator fills instantly and never partially. Live adds queues, partial fills, and buying-power rejects the simulator never showed. [field]

When things fail

Going live

1. The operator turns live trading on. You don't.
2. Bind the live account from the live accounts call.
3. Rehearse the exact order shape on the simulator first, and run every check above on the live order too.
4. Expect live-only rejects the simulator never gave: buying power on a margin account, and DAY after 16:00. [field]
5. If your host or your rules won't send live orders, write the operator a ticket to place by hand. Include:
   • account type, symbol, action, quantity
   • order type, limit or stop, duration (and expiration)
   • route, session
   • the confirm's summary
   • quote time, bid and ask

A person places it.

Permissions and expiry

• Option approval levels:

| Level | Allows | |---|---| | 1 | Covered calls, protective puts | | 2 | Adds long calls and puts | | 3 | Adds spreads | | 4 | Adds naked stock puts | | 5 | Adds naked calls and naked index puts |

Simulator enforcement wasn't tested, so a simulator accept isn't proof live will accept. [docs]

• Intraday margin. FINRA Regulatory Notice 26-10 replaced the pattern-day-trader rules effective June 4, 2026, including the day-trade count and the $25,000 minimum equity requirement. Firms may phase in until October 20, 2027. docs TradeStation's introduction page says the Pattern Day Trader designation has been eliminated. docs The day-trading FAQ says there is no day-trade counter. Margin equity at or above $2,000 is required for full intraday buying power. At or above $2,000, intraday buying power is four times margin excess and overnight buying power is two times margin excess. Below $2,000, both are one times margin excess. Day trading is only permitted in margin accounts. Cash accounts, IRA accounts, and accounts without a signed margin agreement are not eligible. docs The requirements page says the same $2,000 threshold, with up to 4x margin excess intraday at or above $2,000 and 1x below. docs
• Do not count day trades. Do not enforce a $25,000 gate. Read buying power from the account each session. A buying-power reject still stops the session.
• Options in the money by $0.01 or more are generally auto-exercised. [docs] Don't hold a simulator option through expiry to learn how live behaves.

Symbols

• Stock: uppercase ticker, for example SPY.
• Option: ROOT YYMMDDC/PSTRIKE with a space, for example SPY 261120C765. A half strike keeps its decimal, for example KO 261120C67.5. [docs] URL-encode the space on the API.
• Index: $SPX.X for quotes and chains; SPX 261120C7700 for the contract.
• Futures contract: root, month code, 2-digit year, for example ESZ26.
  • @ES is a chart symbol. It can't be traded, and the MCP rejects any @ symbol.
  • Front month: quote the nearby contracts and take the highest DailyOpenInterest. ESZ26 had about 1.92M against about 15k for ESH27.
• Date formats differ by MCP tool: MM-DD-YYYY for the option tools, YYYY-MM-DD for bars and historical orders.
• The MCP rejects unknown fields. Send only the documented ones.

Saving tokens and calls

• A full order round trip on the MCP: 6 calls (positions, quote, confirm, place, poll, positions), about 1,650 tokens.
• Per-call cost on the MCP:
  • confirm-order is about 2,100 characters.
  • get-orders-detailed by symbol returns all of today's orders for that symbol (about 900 characters each), so it gets more expensive through the day.
  • get-orders-overview adds about 2,000 characters of instructions every time.
• The MCP's built-in guide (ask-tradestation) tells the model to "absorb silently." This pack outranks it; say so if they conflict. Its display rules (show every section before asking) are for a person approving in chat.
• On the API, stream orders and positions instead of polling when running all day. [docs]
• API rate limits:
  • 320 account and order calls per 5 minutes.
  • 500 quotes per 5 minutes.
  • 90 per minute for each option endpoint.
  • On a 429, wait X-RateLimit-Reset seconds, retry once, then stop.

After a crash or restart

1. Read open orders, today's orders, and positions.
2. Match them to your own log by order id. Keep a log with time (ET), symbol, action, quantity, type, price, duration, order id and status.
3. An order that isn't in your log isn't yours to cancel. It may be another session's, or yours from before the crash. There's no client-tag field.
4. Find your own unlogged order by symbol and time window, then log it. This was tested: a deliberately unlogged order was found this way.

The order playbook

1. Read the clock (US Eastern) and name the session.
2. Read the position for the symbol, then pick the action from the table.
3. Get a fresh quote. It must not be delayed, halted, restricted or not-entitled.
4. Build the order and check it:
   • type and duration against the session
   • the tick
   • quantity against the position and the desk limits
   • buying power read from the account this session. Do not count day trades. Do not enforce a $25,000 gate
   • uppercase symbol
   • GTD within 90 days
5. Check that it isn't already working or recently sent (see Don't double-send).
6. Confirm. Require a confirmation with no errors. Check that the summaryMessage price equals the price you sent.
7. Place.
   • MCP: the returned orderConfirmID plus environment: "SIM" (single use, valid 60 minutes).
   • API: POST /v3/orderexecution/orders with an OrderConfirmID of 1–22 characters.
8. Poll until the status is final. Ignore the UNKNOWN on the place response.
9. Re-read the position. On a close, the leg must say Close and the position must not have flipped.
10. Log it with the quote time, bid and ask.
11. To change the price, replace it (same id). To change the duration, cancel and resend.

Don't know: stop and ask

• Futures outside 09:30–16:00 ET, and the maintenance break.
• Holidays and early closes.
• Whether plus-duration option orders work once placed.
• What OPG and CLO do once placed.
• Index options outside 09:30 to 16:15. The extended-hours page lists GTH 07:15 to 09:25 and curb 16:15 to 17:00. Those windows were not tested.
• Whether a combo takes GTC or only DAY.
• Trailing stops on the simulator.
• The short-sale locate workflow beyond the account flag.
• Live partial fills.
• Option expiry on a simulator account.
• Ticks for other products on the MCP.

Look it up

• API specification (paths, fields, examples): https://api.tradestation.com/docs/specification/
• Sign-in and tokens: https://api.tradestation.com/docs/fundamentals/authentication/auth-code/
• Simulator vs live: https://api.tradestation.com/docs/fundamentals/sim-vs-live/
• Rate limits: https://api.tradestation.com/docs/fundamentals/rate-limiting/rate-limiting-overview/
• Getting an API key: https://api.tradestation.com/docs/faq/
• Stock durations: https://help.tradestation.com/10_00/eng/tradestationhelp/tb_definitions/trade_bar_durations_equities.htm
• Option durations: https://help.tradestation.com/10_00/eng/tradestationhelp/tb_definitions/trade_bar_durations_options.htm
• Futures symbols: https://help.tradestation.com/10_00/eng/TradeStationHelp/symbology/futures_symbology.htm
• TradeStation FAQs (trading hours, extended-hours orders, day-trading buying power, option exercise; open in a browser): https://www.tradestation.com/faqs/
• Day trading requirements: https://www.tradestation.com/learn/market-basics/stocks-etfs/day-trading-rules/day-trading-requirements/
• Introduction to day trading (no Pattern Day Trader designation): https://www.tradestation.com/learn/market-basics/stocks-etfs/day-trading-rules/introduction-to-day-trading/
• Extended-hours options: https://www.tradestation.com/insights/extended-hours-options-trading/
• FINRA Regulatory Notice 26-10: https://www.finra.org/rules-guidance/notices/26-10
• Cboe equity options extended trading hours FAQ: https://www.cboe.com/document/tech-spec/document/technical-specifications/equity-options-extended-trading-hours-faq/
• MCP (open in a browser): https://www.tradestation.com/platforms-and-tools/mcp/