Position Flips & Reversals

A flip is when the leader goes from being net long to net short, or short to long, in one action — crossing straight through flat rather than closing out and later opening a new position. This article explains exactly what MimikTrader does on the follower side when that happens.

One Crossing Order, Not Close-Then-Open

When the leader reverses, an eligible follower places one single crossing order that carries it from its current side, through flat, to the new side. It is not a close order followed by a separate opening order — it is a single order whose size is large enough to both exit the old position and establish the new one.

Example

Say a follower is holding 2 long MNQ, mirroring a leader who was also long. The leader now reverses to short. On the follower, MimikTrader places one order that both closes the 2 long and opens the new short in the same action — the follower ends up short, having crossed through flat once, rather than seeing a separate flatten and a separate reopen.

Flips Are Sized by the Multiplier

The crossing order is sized using the follower’s own sizing multiplier applied to the leader’s trade, exactly like any other opening trade. The follower flips onto the new side at itsconfigured size, not a forced copy of the leader’s net position.

Concretely, if a follower is on a 0.5 multiplier and the leader reverses in a way that puts the leader short 4 ES, the follower’s new-side target size is computed from the multiplier the same way opening trades are sized — see Position Sizing for the full formula and rounding rule.

Brackets Are Not Rebuilt Automatically

After a flip, MimikTrader does notinvent a new take-profit or stop-loss bracket for the follower’s new position on its own. The copier never synthesizes a bracket that the leader did not place.

What does happen: if the leader places a new bracket on its reversed position, that bracket copies to the followers through the normal bracket-copy path, just like any other leader bracket. So the rule is simple — the follower gets the protective orders the leader actually places, and only those.

Locked or Closing-Only Followers Cap to Flat

A flip has two parts: the close-to-flat portion and the new-side opening portion. On a follower that is restricted — locked, in closing-only mode, pending a lock, outside the group’s symbol whitelist, or otherwise blocked from opening — MimikTrader always allows the close-to-flat portion and suppresses the opening portion.

The result is that a restricted follower ends flat rather than flipped. It exits with the leader (closing is never blocked) but does not take on the new opposite-side position. This is deliberate: you can always get out, even when you are prevented from opening something new.

• Healthy follower → crosses through flat, ends flipped onto the new side.
• Restricted follower → closes to flat, does not open the new side, ends flat.

Same-Symbol Flips Always Copy

Reversing on the same contract — long MNQ to short MNQ — is a normal flip and is handled exactly as described above. There is no setting that blocks a same-symbol flip: the follower always follows the leader through flat.

Hedging prevention is a cross-symbol guard: it stops a follower from opening an opposing position on a different contract in the same family (for example, holding long NQ while a copied order would open short MNQ). It never interferes with a straight reversal on one and the same instrument. For the full picture of that configurable guard, see Preventing Hedged Positions.

Quick Summary

• An eligible follower always reverses in one crossing order — flips follow the leader.
• The crossing order is sized by the follower’s multiplier, not the leader’s net.
• Brackets are not auto-rebuilt; only the leader’s own new bracket copies over.
• A locked, closing-only, whitelist-restricted, or risk-sync-pending follower caps to flat instead of flipping.
• Same-symbol flips are never gated; Prevent Hedging governs different-symbol same-family exposure.