AllocQty (FIX tag 80)

QtyFIX 4.4FIX 4.2FIX 5.0 SP2

AllocQty (tag 80) is a Qty field defined in FIX 4.4, FIX 4.2 and FIX 5.0 SP2. It appears in 12 message types and is required in 1 of them. FIX 4.2 calls this field AllocShares; the tag number is unchanged, so the two are the same field on the wire.

Also known as AllocShares

FIX 4.2 calls tag 80 AllocShares. It is the same field on the wire — only the name changed — so a message encoded by either side interoperates.

At a glance

Tag: 80
Name: AllocQty
Datatype: Qty (float)
Dialects: FIX 4.4, FIX 4.2 and FIX 5.0 SP2
Messages: 12

What the specification says

FIX 4.4

Quantity to be allocated to specific sub-account (Prior to FIX 4.2 this field was of type int)

FIX 4.2

Number of shares to be allocated to specific sub-account (Prior to FIX 4.2 this field was of type int)

FIX 5.0 SP2

Quantity to be allocated to specific sub-account

Descriptions are quoted from the FIX Orchestra sources under the Apache 2.0 licence.

A real message using tag 80

NewOrderSingle · FIX 4.4

Tag	Field	Wire value	Meaning
8	BeginString	FIX.4.4
9	BodyLength	160
35	MsgType	D	Order – Single
49	SenderCompID	BOARTEAM
56	TargetCompID	COUNTERPARTY
34	MsgSeqNum	2
52	SendingTime	20240101-12:00:00.000
11	ClOrdID	ORD-10042
78	NoAllocs2 entries	2	repeating group
79	AllocAccount	EXAMPLE
80	AllocQty	1000000
79	AllocAccount	EXAMPLE
80	AllocQty	1000000
54	Side	1	Buy
60	TransactTime	20240101-12:00:00.000
40	OrdType	1	Market
10	CheckSum	053

Edit and decode it yourself

Shown with | separators for readability. On the wire FIX uses SOH (0x01), an invisible control byte — and because BodyLength and CheckSum are computed over the actual bytes, the two forms have different checksums. Both are valid and both decode here.

Open in the full decoder →

Generated from the FIX 4.4 dictionary and verified at build time: it parses and validates with no issues. Open the decoder to try your own message.

Where tag 80 appears

Requiredness is a property of the message, not of the field: the same tag can be optional in one message and conditionally required in another.

Message	MsgType	FIX 4.4	FIX 4.2	FIX 5.0 SP2	Where in the message
AllocationInstruction	J	Conditional	Required	Optional	inside the AllocGrp component
AllocationInstructionAck	P	—	—	Optional	inside the AllocAckGrp component
AllocationInstructionAlert	BM	—	—	Optional	inside the AllocGrp component
AllocationReport	AS	Conditional	—	Optional	inside the AllocGrp component
AllocationReportAck	AT	—	—	Optional	inside the AllocAckGrp component
Confirmation	AK	Required	—	Required	directly on the message body
CrossOrderCancelReplaceRequest	t	Conditional	—	Optional	inside SideCrossOrdModGrp › PreAllocGrp
ExecutionReport	8	—	—	Optional	inside the PreAllocGrp component
MultilegOrderCancelReplace	AC	Conditional	—	Optional	inside the PreAllocMlegGrp component
NewOrderCross	s	Conditional	—	Optional	inside SideCrossOrdModGrp › PreAllocGrp
NewOrderList	E	Conditional	Optional	Optional	inside ListOrdGrp › PreAllocGrp
NewOrderMultileg	AB	Conditional	—	Optional	inside the PreAllocMlegGrp component
NewOrderSingle	D	Conditional	Optional	Optional	inside the PreAllocGrp component
OrderCancelReplaceRequest	G	Conditional	Optional	Optional	inside the PreAllocGrp component
TradeCaptureReport	AE	Conditional	—	Optional	inside TrdCapRptSideGrp › TrdAllocGrp
TradeCaptureReportAck	AR	Conditional	—	Optional	inside the TrdAllocGrp component

Wire format

A decimal quantity. Fractional quantities are legal, which is why this is a float family rather than an integer. @boarteam/fix parses the value as a number and reports parse/invalid-float when it does not lex as one; the raw string is kept so precision and trailing zeros are never lost.

Read tag 80 in TypeScript

decode.tsts

import { createFixEngine } from "@boarteam/fix";import { dictionary } from "@boarteam/fix-dict-fix44";const fix = createFixEngine(dictionary);const { message, issues } = fix.parse(raw);const field = message.fields[80];field?.name;   // "AllocQty"field?.raw;    // the verbatim wire stringfield?.value;  // coerced to a number

Decode this in your own code

The same engine that produced the decoded example above is an Apache-2.0 npm package with zero runtime dependencies. It runs in Node and in the browser, and parse() returns problems as data instead of throwing.

npm i @boarteam/fix @boarteam/fix-dict-fix44

Try the decoder Source on GitHub