Trading Software

[GreatPig]

Has anyone forked out for the Saratoga simulation software? Is it worth the price (for a beginner)?

http://www.saratoga.com.au

Also, any recommendations for free (or cheap) charting software? I downloaded the free version of FCharts already, but haven't tried using it yet.

Thanks.

GP

 

[still_in_school]

Hi GP,

instead forking the expensive price for a software simulator, just paper trade a few stocks, or even create watch lists, from sites such as commsec and etrade, watch the share and its performance, in all honesty theres no need to spend so much money on software simulators...

also check out the asx website... every few months they hold a sharemarket game, where they give you a hypotheical $50,000 to trade with....

Cheers,
sis

 

[GreatPig]

Hi sis,

Can you get historical price information from those sites?

I rather liked the sound of being able to get the last 12 years prices and being able to test charting ideas against real prices. Doing it with current data only would take much longer to evaluate how well the plan was working.

But of course it costs (although is still relatively cheap compared to some of the charting packages I've seen).

I've seen the ASX game and will probably have a go at that too.

Cheers,
GP

 

[still_in_school]

Hi GP,

for sure, those sites offer the historical information, they also offer interactive charts, allowing you to draw your own trend lines and add in market indicators at the same time... pratice first on the interactive charts, before purchasing any full price software...

... again depending how frequent you are going to trade, will be dependant if you need such software programs

Cheers,
sis

 

[JetDollars]

I still believe charting in comsec and etrade are good, but if you really want to trade professionally then you got to have appropriate charting software.

Of course it come with a price, but if that price make you more money that it's worth it.

I will get one when I am ready to trade.

 

[GreatPig]

sis & JetDollars,

Thanks. I'll take a look at commsec and etrade.

Cheers,
GP

 

[Aceyducey]

Yup got a copy of it.

It's a good first try for the company & certainly has value for people testing out trading systems.

It's not the best charting package around, but certainly has it's good points.

Take a look at incredible charts as well - that's not bad.

Cheers,

Aceyducey

 

[GreatPig]

Thanks Aceyducey.

Bought a few more books on share trading yesterday, to complement the few I bought about 20 years ago and read but never got around to using (primarily because I had no money then and I was more interested in futures & options than shares).

Anyway, they'll make a change from all the reading on real estate I've been doing recently

Do you know of any sites where you can get free historical share price info? I found float.com.au the other day but had huge difficulties downloading the files. I finally managed to get a few years off it, but then I lost connection to the site and it hasn't come back yet. Unfortunately the missing years are the most recent ones (except for this year)

GP

 

[JetDollars]

GreatPig, Aceyducey, WayneL

Great to see you around here more often so now we can discuss share investing and trading more freely than in www.propertyinvesting.com where we only allow to discuss just property.

Back to the subject. I currently looking to buy a trading software for future trading.

Peter Spann has a trading software where it combine technical and fundamental in one package. The downside is that it cost $1500 initial and $680 for data renewal yearly.

I am still looking for a cheaper product and at the moment I found Metastock quite good.

Any suggestion?

 

[GreatPig]

JetDollars,

So far I've just downloaded the free version of FCharts from http://www.spacejock.com. It doesn't include any data source though. There's also a pro version of it for around A$95, but I have no idea how good it is compared to other packages.

I've just started reading Leon Wilson's "The Business of Share Trading" (2003) and he discusses a few packages. He says that he uses MetaStock (presumably the pro version) & EzyChart pro himself, but also suggests looking at some other Ezy products (EzyStation & SuperCharts), ShareFinder, Market Analyst 3, HotTrader, OmniTrader, TradeStation, and StockDoctor for fundamental stuff. He seems to consider SuperCharts (which I can't see on their Website) and TradeStation (which seems to be a US-based trading system rather than just software) as being the top-end products. Apparently the Ezy products have a proprietary data format, limiting your choice of suppliers.

Taking a look at the EzyCast Website (http://www.ezycast.com), I found the following prices (all A$):

EzyStation - $960
EzyPro - $729 (EzyChart + 2 others)
EzyChart - $429

Data prices are for one year $595 for all stocks & warrants, $350 for EOD, and $195 for after midnight EOD.

Sharefinder's MarketMaster software costs $990 and is at:

http://www.sharefinder.com.au

Market Analyst 3 costs $795 and is at :

http://www.market-analyst.com/products/Market_Analyst_3_Professional/

HotTrader and OmniTrader are other Paritech products that you can see on their Website.

GP

 

[sandybeachs]

hi greatpig..

try this site..

www.incrediblecharts.com

regards

 

[Aceyducey]

I've used MetaStock for years, but recently took a look at Bullcharts & like what I see (www.bullcharts.com.au)

Cheers,

Aceyducey

 

[wayneL]

Another one to check out is

www.amibroker.com

$149 US and can do everything that metastock does.

Also you can get free data from Yahoo (the data is not perfect for intricate backtesting, but good enough for the discretionary trader)

If you need perfect data, there is always the paid services.

Cheers

 

[GreatPig]

Aceyducey,

Bullcharts

Just took a quick look and I think it could do with a few more indicators

GP

 

[JetDollars]

Thanks guys...there are so many software out there. I have to sit down for hour to go through each one of them to find out which one will suite me most.

Thanks once again, much appreciated.

 

[GreatPig]

Just looking up info on BullCharts data and can't quite figure it out. Does it have a proprietary data format? Is it only available from one supplier and/or does it also support other data formats?

It's not clear from what little info I can find on it.

Cheers,
GP

 

[Aceyducey]

Bullstocks has it's own data feed AND you can use Metastock format data, from whatever source you like.

Cheers,

Aceyducey

 

[GreatPig]

Thanks Aceyducey.

GP

 

[stefan]

Assuming that you could wish what your software should look like, what would you value most? What is it that you would like to have, but can't find?

I'd appreciate to see a few comments. I'm currently looking into this and I couldn't find a package that would be worth all the money they normally ask for.

 

[malachii]

Has anyone any experience/knowledge of the Guppy Traders Essentials charting package that is produced and sold by Daryl Guppy??