Why does the close price on the statement not match the chart?

[Shadow Trader]

Zoom into the candle where a trade closed, and the statement price sits outside it, or at a level the chart never printed. That feels like a bug, but there are usually ordinary explanations, and knowing them saves a pointless support ticket.

First, which price does the chart draw? Most retail charts are built from bid prices. A buy closes at the bid, so the exit matches the chart. A sell closes at the ask, which the standard chart does not show. The gap between them is the spread, so a short's close price can sit above anything the bid chart painted. Many platforms have an option to draw the ask line, which explains the difference quickly.

Second, the chart is a summary. A one-minute candle records the high and low of the quotes the platform received, and a brief spike on the server's feed may not appear in that history if the terminal missed ticks or the history comes from a different source. The server price used for the fill is the authority, not the chart.

Third, timing. The time on the statement is the server time of execution, while the chart may be set to another time zone or may show bar-open time. Matching the wrong candle produces a mismatch that is just a misread.

Fourth, execution style. Market closes can fill at a price different from the one displayed when the click happened. Stops and targets fill at the first available price after the level is hit, which can be through the level during fast moves.

Fifth, history differs between data sources. A chart loaded from another feed will not agree to the last decimal.

A decent way to investigate is to pull tick-level data around the exact second, compare against bid and ask together, and check the server time offset before blaming anyone. If the exit still sits outside the bid and ask range at that second, the question is worth sending to the broker along with the order ticket numbers.

What was the biggest mismatch found between statement and chart, and what turned out to explain it?