Automated trading through Excel

Quote from tntneo:...Therefore, getting free (even paid to them) access to a proven edge (yours) is a deal made in heaven.

I agree mostly with what you said, but it's not necessarily an unfair deal ("made in heaven") to swap development work for free personal use of the edge, as long as there is a reasonable amount of liquidity available. Good developers are not cheap, contrary to what a number of people seem to expect. Also, I can definitely see where the system will get to be far more robust if the developer can use it himself and see bugs or areas of possible improvement first-hand.

In case it needs to be said, I will swap (my) development work for right-of-use. :)
 
So many options to explore. Thanks for all the responses and feedback, I have a lot to think about over the holidays.

My new years resolution though, is to begin the journey of automation of my methods.

Happy Hollidays ET :D
 
ChaosNSX,

I've talked to a collegue of mine who developed a strategy by the use of a company name Strategy Runner (www.strun.com). He indicated that they were able to implement a complex strategy for him in $1500 and he was also given a backtesting tool in order to tune his strategy for free.
also, he mentioned that the strategy is operating from within the company's server. He indicated unlike TradeBolt or TradeStation, this is a very simple solution for him - he doesn't have to be connected to the Internet, be dependent on his own PC (again, its running from the server) or mess with an easylanguage code.


Hope this helps and Merry Christmas to all of you...
 
I have used Excel VBA to automate a strategy tading 8 different futures simultaneously without any problem. In fact it works very well and for someone with limited programming experience is a lot easier than writing a dedicate app using C++ or Java.
 
Quote from alanm:
I agree mostly with what you said, but it's not necessarily an unfair deal ("made in heaven") to swap development work for free personal use of the edge, as long as there is a reasonable amount of liquidity available. Good developers are not cheap, contrary to what a number of people seem to expect. Also, I can definitely see where the system will get to be far more robust if the developer can use it himself and see bugs or areas of possible improvement first-hand.
More...

that's a very good point alan. I wanted to make the point about cost and forgot.
yes, development if it is serious, professional, bug free etc is much more expensive than people think.

so for complex system developments, right of use is a reasonable consideration.
also a very good point you make about fine tuning, debugging. it's the most difficult part of the development process. and in our business errors cost money.

in any case, you need a very good programmer(s) and one who knows about trading. so don't consider this lightly.. 50$ to 150$ or much more per hour depending on language, complexity, rights etc..
 
Sidinuk...

"I have used Excel VBA to automate a strategy tading 8 different futures simultaneously without any problem"

Personally, I don't thing VBA is that simple to write for someone who doesn't have any programming knowledge.
Additionally, I think that a programming language without pointers (such as visual basic) is not even worth mentioning in this type of business.
Moreover, I wouldn't even know where to start in order to tune the strategy, since Excel has no backtesting abilities.
 
I have had some good results with rentacoder.com...the bids come in reasonably priced(although there are a few outliers), and the work has been good...My suggestion is to break up your project into parts and have a different coder for each part of the project. This will protect your edge and hard work.

Good trading to all!

Mike
 
I use Excel and Interactive Brokers. But it all depends on what you do. For example, a lot of my work is based on fundamentals (interest rates, earnings, etc). You obviously can't use a TradeStation for that.

The major advantage of Excel is that a non-programmer can easily make changes to the system. However, you still have to know what you are doing so you don't send break the system.

It also depends on what you are trading. If you are doing index arbitrage, you'll want the fastest method of placing the trades, before the scalp disappears. But if you are using an end-of-day type system, Excel should work fine.

I've been using my automated Excel system for over two years now. I have had no problems with it and I am willing to leave it running while I am away.
 
I have done a number of automated applications with Excel. It's good for getting something out quick. You also want to make sure you put in safeguards, like checks to make sure that what should have been executed gets executed, what should have been cancelled gets cancelled, if quotes stop coming, alert the user, things like that.

The nice thing about Excel is it's very easy to modify the formulas used to generate the trades on the fly. Also, for the programs I've done for other people, it lets them put in their own formulas while my code generates the trades based on their triggers, so for peace of mind, in those cases, they don't even have to tell me what triggers their trades in case they want to keep that information secret.

I would definitely recommend doing a first run with Excel because of the short time to get up and running. If it works out well, then you can spend the $$$ you earn to make a system that can handle even more than Excel can.

Cash
 
Ive just ordered my first learning book on programming VBA in excel, and i know nothing from before.

Seems to be an easy way to get started really, and as said here, you can always learn sophisticated programming later. Or hire someone.

ORM
 
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