MetaStock vs. TradeStation

One thing I use AmiBroker for is backtesting a concept against a wide range of securities (all NASDAQ for instance) for a long period of time. I don't think TS can do backtesting of a portfolio of stocks; I think you have to individually select and apply the strategy to each one. If I'm wrong let me know - please - because I have TS also but am using AmiBroker for this.
 
Quote from OptionScreen:

Are you saying AFL can do things that EL can't do? give an example, because i don't think so?
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TS8.1 & EL doesn't appear to support backtesting (someone correct me if I'm mistaken, as I've only been on TS & digging into EL for a few weeks now).

By backtesting I mean some sort of tick/bar/whatever replay (as in eSignal) or going back intraday or historically on a chart bar/tick data. This is a big feature in AB (eSignal has tick "replay") you write some AFL with some conditions and AB goes back over the bar/tick data in an interval you specify (3-min, 10-min, 1-day, etc) and generates buy/sell (and any user created column as well).

Note that I was using the Real Time version of AB with eSignal as the data feed.

There are some portfolio management functions as well to "manage" your profit/loss, etc. I see that EasyLang has this but all EL functions return "real account info", exactly your dollar cents in your brokerage account. So AB you can easily create an test account, fund it, and see your results against past historical data.

Any condition would "fill" with RT data (say, 3-min bars) back as far as AB has defined, say 8000 bars.

Nutshell AFL example:

Buy=Cross(MACD(fast,slow),Signal(fast,slow));

The Automatic Analysis window (the "backtest" window) will populate rows with the date and time that the condition was met with the current symbol or complete list (stocks here) Then stick some code in there to buy 100 shares at xx in your "test" account, and so on.

These links will explain better:

http://www.amibroker.com/docs/ab401.html
http://amibroker.com/newsletter/01-2005.html

EL can't write to a disk file, as far as I know. Thus I am resigned to attach a VB script to do this and execute it in EL. Why would I care? I'd like to write a balance in $$ in a "test" account to disk file so I can re-read the number/data the next time I execute that AFL script, or another script. AB allows you to export csv data from results, but if you're doing it over and over, why not write/append to a text file.

FH = fopen("c:\\temp\ABTest.txt", "a");
fputs(minuteTime +Name() +WriteVal(rtLast, 1.2) +WriteVal(rtChange, 1.2) +WriteVal(rtChangePct, 1.1) +WriteVal(rtTotVol, 1.0) +n, FH);
 
Quote from mlsignups:

One thing I use AmiBroker for is backtesting a concept against a wide range of securities (all NASDAQ for instance) for a long period of time. I don't think TS can do backtesting of a portfolio of stocks; I think you have to individually select and apply the strategy to each one. If I'm wrong let me know - please - because I have TS also but am using AmiBroker for this.
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You can do it with TS a couple of ways. One is to use macros to automate the testing, the other one is to use radarscreen. If you use radarscreen you can have results on a backtest of a large number of issues in an excel -like format and you can copy that to excel for further analysis. I am doing that currently and when they come out with folio testing I probably will not have a reason to change from the radarscreen implementation, it just suits what I do so well.
 
I own Metastock from 7 to 9. I own TS from 2000i to the current 8.

Hands down, TS is the winner over MS. Easylanguage is more powerful than MS buy/sell scripts.

I would be very careful when trying to make a system 100% automated, but TS should be able to do what you need.
 
Amibroker is not the only program to do portfolio testing. TradersStudio allows portfolio optimization across baskets of markets with just a few mouse clicks. In addition it also offer integrated money management.

In terms of TradeStation versus Metastock, EasyLanguage is much more powerful than MetaStock's language so I can see where this gives TradeStation an edge. Until TradersStudio
TradeStation's Easy Language was the only language for traders which allowed them to think about processing one bar at a time, with variables being able to access past bars values.
Currently TradersStudio is only "End of Day", but we have a real time version currently in beta.

We realize alot of people don't want to switch trading platforms because they have invested a lot of time and money in code they have written. Because of this we developed the a migration tool which can translate 90+ percent of EasyLanguage code so that it can be used in TradersStudio with only a few mouse click.

If you want to see what others are saying about TradersStudio here is a link to user comments and reviews. Including from several MetaStock users.

http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=33


If you would like to see the migration tool in action here a link :

http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=83
 
Quote from maxwell_e:


By backtesting I mean some sort of tick/bar/whatever replay (as in eSignal) or going back intraday or historically on a chart bar/tick data. This is a big feature in AB (eSignal has tick "replay") you write some AFL with some conditions and AB goes back over the bar/tick data in an interval you specify (3-min, 10-min, 1-day, etc) and generates buy/sell (and any user created column as well).

Every tradstation version can do this, except superchart (TS4).

There are some portfolio management functions as well to "manage" your profit/loss, etc. I see that EasyLang has this but all EL functions return "real account info", exactly your dollar cents in your brokerage account. So AB you can easily create an test account, fund it, and see your results against past historical data.
Any condition would "fill" with RT data (say, 3-min bars) back as far as AB has defined, say 8000 bars.

Wrong, Tradstation can do both RT and historicaly ,
you can use strategy position & strategy performance
catogary functions in your system backtesting.

EL can't write to a disk file, as far as I know. Thus I am resigned to attach a VB script to do this and execute it in EL. Why would I care? I'd like to write a balance in $$ in a "test" account to disk file so I can re-read the number/data the next time I execute that AFL script, or another script. AB allows you to export csv data from results, but if you're doing it over and over, why not write/append to a text file.

If you mean writing chart price data or texts to your
hard drive resulting or meeting from certain calculation
or condition, then you can output to print (printer), print
(print log window) or file (hard drive file), all is done by:

print(printer, "this is the close", close:4:2); writes to printer
print("any text", printing infos[formating}; writes to print log
print(file("C:\data\filename.txt"), date, time,..); writes to hard Disk
fileappend("str_filename", "str_txt"); File can be created, if don't exist
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Quote from Murray Ruggiero:

Amibroker is not the only program to do portfolio testing. TradersStudio allows portfolio optimization across baskets of markets with just a few mouse clicks. In addition it also offer integrated money management.

In terms of TradeStation versus Metastock, EasyLanguage is much more powerful than MetaStock's language so I can see where this gives TradeStation an edge. Until TradersStudio
TradeStation's Easy Language was the only language for traders which allowed them to think about processing one bar at a time, with variables being able to access past bars values.
Currently TradersStudio is only "End of Day", but we have a real time version currently in beta.

We realize alot of people don't want to switch trading platforms because they have invested a lot of time and money in code they have written. Because of this we developed the a migration tool which can translate 90+ percent of EasyLanguage code so that it can be used in TradersStudio with only a few mouse click.

If you want to see what others are saying about TradersStudio here is a link to user comments and reviews. Including from several MetaStock users.

http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=33


If you would like to see the migration tool in action here a link :

http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=83
More...

Few questions:
-Is Tradestudio updated for functions available in TS8.1?

-Which VB version (6, .net,...)language traderstudio is modeled after?

-where i can see language syntex documentation(can we
see the source code for reversed words written in VB also)?
Can it be used as language to be used for excel trading?
any differance or limitations from langauge used in excel?

-soon tradestation releasing portfolio testing, why anyone
have to use your product? And what EOD version mean?
for daily charts only?

I think this table is not updated
http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=120
 
Just a sample of things that are available in AmiBroker, but not in Tradestation:

* true portfolio-level backtesting
with entry signals ranking
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/h_portfolio.html

* backtesting of rotational (fund switching) trading systems
http://www.amibroker.com/f?enablerotationaltrading

* built-in 3D, animated optimization charts (user can rotate, zoom, and "fly" the chart in real-time)
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/h_optimization.html

* fully user-definable backtest statistics
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/a_custommetrics.html
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/a_custombacktest.html

* layered charting tools (as in CAD programs)
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/h_layers.html

* multiple-security composite indicators/stats
http://www.amibroker.com/guide/a_addtocomposite.html
(this is actually doable in TS but very slow. AmiBroker's ATC is blazing fast)

Best regards,
Tomasz Janeczko
amibroker.com
 
Quote from OptionScreen:

Few questions:
-Is TradersStudio updated for functions available in TS8.1?

-Which VB version (6, .net,...)language traderstudio is modeled after?

-where i can see language syntax documentation(can we
see the source code for reversed words written in VB also)?
Can it be used as language to be used for excel trading?
any difference or limitations from language used in excel?

-soon tradestation releasing portfolio testing, why anyone
have to use your product? And what EOD version mean?
for daily charts only?

I think this table is not updated
http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=120
More...

The current version of TradersStudio the translator support code up though 6.0 including of course Tradestation 4.0 and Tradestation 2000i. I am not sure if we are going to try to keep up with the current versions of TradeStation. Our goal is to give the core , old 4.0, 2000i user a new home, without having to lose their EasyLanguage investment.

TradersStudio basic a hybrid of Excel VBA and EasyLanguage. I have included our language reference help in this response.

First , I don't know how soon TradeStation will release this portfolio level testing but I am sure it will not be as easy to use or a powerful as TradersStudio because TradeStation was not designed from the ground up as a portfolio optimization tool. In addition we have special backtesting and money management for stocks. Most likely it will be an addin ,and not built into the design of the product. This is why portfolio analysis is only 1-2 mouse click with TradersStudio even if you are analyzing 100's of markets.

One thing you get from a small company is the fact that we respond to our users very quickly. A large company like TradeStation or Metastock or Fidelity can't do that.
What make you think that TradeStation portfolio testing will be a work of art when they have not been able to do this for 10 years!. Another big issue is that with our product you can have your own data vendor and broker. Remember TradeStation business is brokerage, the Trading Platform is secondary. They want you to have a large and active account with them to get the software for free. Otherwise you need to pay by the month, with TradersStudio it is yours to use without addition fees. Remember Trading software is our bussiness , TradeStation main source of revenue is brokerage. Here at TradersStudio we are focused on our customers software needs.

Yes currently we are a End of day platform , daily charts. Our real time product is in beta and we hope to have it released for March 2006.

I have included both the Language Reference and our global macro reference. Please review the video's on TradersStudio

Overview sessions and portfiolo testing
http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=81
Money Management
http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=82

Global Macro's
http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=121

TradersStudio power is amazing, for example combining TradersStudio Global Macro's and Excel we were able to write a walk forward optimizer which we ship for free with TradersStudio. This is a powerful example of what this product can do.

We also ship a optimal f money management macro free , which uses Excel and TradersStudio to perform optimal f based money management.

http://www.tradersstudio.com/Default.aspx?tabid=36
 

Attachments

You are correct, the table need to be updated. We are currently planing on a major upgrade of our web site over the next few months. We plan on changing this table soon. Notice that we state that

Info on competitor’s products is based on publicly available information as of Dec. 1, 2004.

At the bottom of the table.
 
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