Bracket Order

A bracket order is an entry order submitted together with its exits — a take profit and a stop loss — so that the moment the entry fills, both protective orders go live automatically. The entry can be a market, limit, or stop order; the take profit and stop loss legs are typically linked to each other as an OCO pair once the entry is filled.

Most futures platforms offer some version of a bracket as a preset: pick an entry, specify a profit target and a stop distance (often in ticks or points), and the platform submits all three orders as one action instead of three separate manual steps.

The gap between placing an entry and placing its exits is where undefined-risk trades happen — a fill with no stop working yet, even for a few seconds, is exposure with no boundary. Bracket orders close that gap by submitting the protection at the same time as the entry, which matters most on fast-moving contracts like NQ or ES where a few seconds of unprotected exposure can be the difference between a manageable loss and a limit breach.

Prop firm evaluations and funded accounts in particular reward this discipline: a trader who brackets every entry has a stop working on every position by construction, rather than relying on remembering to add one after the fill.

MimikTrader detects ATM-style bracket structures on the leader account — an entry plus its linked TP/SL legs — and replicates the full bracket to followers, so a follower's filled entry arrives with the same take-profit and stop-loss orders working, sized to that follower's own quantity.