Quick definition
The standardized option contract identifier format defined by the Options Clearing Corporation. Format: ROOT + EXPIRY(YYMMDD) + TYPE(C/P) + STRIKE(8 digits). Example: AAPL260417C00200000.
Format breakdown
Pattern: ROOT (1–6 chars, underlying symbol) + YYMMDD (expiration date) + C or P (call or put) + 8-digit strike (strike × 1000, zero-padded). Example: AAPL260417C00200000 = Apple, expiring April 17 2026, call, $200.00 strike. The 8-digit strike encodes fractional strikes precisely (e.g. $200.50 = 00200500).
Why traders should care
Most retail brokers hide the OCC symbol behind friendlier dropdowns, but when reading trade confirmations, agent logs, or cross-broker reconciliation reports, the OCC symbol is the only ground truth. A copy-paste error in a manual strike field can be caught by re-reading the OCC symbol; a friendly UI label can silently mismatch.
How Treeova uses it
Treeova's broker integrations canonicalize every order to its OCC symbol before submission. The Finatic broker normalizer prefixes options with 'O:' and falls back to symbol-based matching on PARSE-ERR. Every agent log, every audit row, and every realtime position update uses OCC symbols so cross-broker reconciliation is unambiguous and machine-checkable.