Market orders in Cryptsy and BTC-E

Question

Looking at the dynamics of the Cryptsy and BTC-E trading engines you aren't able to place market orders. The orders just seem to be limit orders at the best market rate. For example, I want to buy 20 bitcoins at $700 and the best offer is $700 with 15 coin volume. The offer should get knocked out and the remainder of 5 should be subtracted from the next best offer.

My question is why this doesn't seem to be the case with BTC-E and Cryptsy? If your order volume at market is greater than available volume at set rate it sets up a limit order until the order is filled.

Can anyone confirm this and explain why they do it?

Answer 1

There's nothing a market order can do that a limit order can't do. To place a market order, just place a limit order for the amount you want to buy at the worst price you are willing to pay.

Answer 2

It makes sense to me, if you're telling them you want to buy 20 BTC at $700 USD why would it purchase the remaining 5 BTC at a price higher than you wanted? If you want to buy the 20 BTC immediately, then look at the order book and figure out the price you'll need to enter to have enough volume to fulfill your order. Or use a service like BTX Trader which interfaces with multiple exchange APIs and offers features like market orders, which really just look at the order book and figures out the price for you for an additional comission.

And as to why many exchanges dont offer market orders? Who knows, they're immature? If it really bothers you, it isnt that hard to interface with their API and write a script to place market orders.