Very interesting to be forced to get a better deal than you were hoplig for.

As for Trading on line, I have had the same type of situation in the past as well. Though I set a bid for a company at higher than the ASK because the order was so large the Broker opted to handle it in a manner like Rosedale describes as being an Icegerg BID. And when calling the Broker to find out what was going on that was the way they described it to me. The other thing that was implied on a few of these types of BIDs is that the Broker was handeling a large transaction by another Client and my order would screw up that transaction and consequently they over rode my order momentarily, till the Bigger Special Transaction cleared the Exchange. The good thing in these types of situations is that if you call your Broker you may be able to read the situation between the lines and act acordingly - adjust your bid to get a better price or what ever.

Old Joe

PS: Problem today is that the Volume is rather low and me experiences were with relatively active trading stocks.