Offering any help to members looking to get into the auto trading space.
Anything from hardware selection and optimization to networking and connectivity to data feeds, execution, etc.
I'm going to add a few topics in this thread focusing on platforms, hardware, connectivity, data & execution.
If anyone has questions post them up and I'll be happy to answer as best I can.
Hey Win,
Thanks for your offer of information.
So I am in the middle of the country, and I know milliseconds are like hours on Wall St. I may not be able to do the HFT thing that some can but what are your thoughts on using Tradestation, and or NinjaTrading software to run automated trading systems? Do you think there is profit and an edge there, or are "bigger badder" systems needed?
Thanks
Bob
Hi Bob,
The easy/short answer is software like Tradestation, Ninja and Tradelink are very acceptable ATS solutions no matter where you are in the world.
There is a big difference between a Low-Latency ATS and a High Frequency ATS (or simply ATS that does not need Low-Latency to work). If you have an existing system that can be executed manually an automated solution may be able to expand your tradable stock universe or allow you to free up time to focus on other things.
By Wall Street standards the systems mentioned so far are not inherently fast but many systems are getting better – multi-threaded, better system resource utilization, better integration with the execution and risk-check platforms, etc.
The systems above are an overlay essentially – they lay on top of your existing front end. The drawback of this configuration is that you are pulling data and pushing executions through the front end vs. sending it directly to the execution server. This adds a bit of extra latency and can be buggy, etc. but can be very effective all the way up to the point that you want to receive UDP data and execute in a co-located environment.
The alternative is to cut out your front-end (TWS for example) and build an application capable of receiving data directly, parsing that data, running it through your decision engine or set of rules and then firing off orders directly to your broker’s execution server. This is complicated, time consuming and probably not worth it unless you are trying to play in the Low-Latency space.
If you can manually execute the strategy all of the major retail or mainstream automated solutions will work fine.
Cheers!