Pro-Rata Matching and One-Tick Futures Markets

We find and describe four futures markets where the bid-ask spread is bid down to the fixed price tick size practically all the time, and which match coun- terparties using a pro-rata rule. These four markets’ offered depths at the quotes on average exceed mean market order size by two orders of magnitude, and their order cancellation rates (the probability of any given offered lot being cancelled) are significantly over 96 per cent. We develop a simple theoretical model to explain these facts, where strategic complementarities in the choice of limit order size cause traders to risk overtrading by submitting over-sized limit orders, most of which they expect to cancel.

Joint work with Jonathan Field.