A problem I've bumped into with Alpaca compared to other services is my bot needs 1 second bars, and I believe Alpaca goes down to 1min bars and nothing smaller.
Polygon offers 1 second bars (https://polygon.io/sockets) for $200/mo.
Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
131–140 of 170 posts
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#132My main FUD with alpaca.markets is the ability to transfer assets in/out. It doesn't look like they offer ACATS transfers (although there's not much info on this!). Using them for anything beyond entertainment budget is very scary - you may incur substantial tax liability if e.g. they ever go out of business or you choose to use a different brokerage. Any insight here? Am I missing something? Is there any way to tran…
as far as i know the "actual" backend data is standardized, ie same instrument names and dates etc. Adding to that, by playing in the US markets the SEC and FINRA, have that stipulation of being able to move between institutions in a standardized and regulated way.
long story short, they all have to implement a system to move out and in (well they all want your assets so this part is obvious).
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#133This is a terrible use-case for the command-line.
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#134This is a terrible use-case for the command-line. One of the worst ideas I have come across.
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you saying that alpaca charges a commission on trades by inflating the price and taking a cut? Or through what mechanism do commissioned trades get lower prices?
Free brokerages generally don’t execute orders as quickly in order to sell order flow which allows HFT firms to front-run your trade. If you’re a buy and hold investor, the fractions of a cent you’re losing don’t matter much over the long run but the issue is still there. Generally when you pay for something, it means that somebody is beholden to you if there’s issues. Robinhood et. al. are free because they suck. ht…
No, they sell order flow because market makers know discount brokerage users are uninformed and thus less risky to buy and sell from. However, they actually give you better prices than the public market offers and they have to or else the SEC would fine them [0]. Your link is just about robinhoods shitty infra that couldn't handle their user load and has nothing to do with order flow.
[0]: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2019/6/26/how-brokerages-make-mone...
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#136I don't get it. How does Alpaca offer free broker services?
These "free" stock trading companies cut deals with high-frequency trading firms that buy order flow. The more order flow they buy the more money they make (essentially risk free to them), which is why they are willing to send boatloads of money to companies like Alpaca/Robinhood.
High-frequency trading firms aren't in the business of stocks, they are in the business of building the fastest tech on the planet to connect buyers with sellers, therefore making markets more efficient.
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#137This is a terrible use-case for the command-line.
Could you elaborate? I understand it's pretty niche, but not sure why it is terrible to have a cli for it?
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#138File it under:New ways to lose money
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#139What's closest to Alpaca for UK based traders?
Not seen anything with both free trades and an API in the UK. I would like to do this to implement simple strategies - for instance mirror indices but with user defined filters (S&P500 minus hospitality, airlines and oil, as an example).
Freetrade, 212 Trading and soon Robinhood offer commission free traedes in the UK but no API
Re: Show HN: Trade stocks from the command line with no commission
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have direct experience building the fix layers for integrating a variety of exchanges. I think FIX is a net negative. The standardization provides so little, there are so many murky edge cases in each implementation and the protocol encoding is so bad, I’d rather just program against the proprietary API. On the exchanges at least the binary APIs make so much more sense.
I wish exchanges would do like Eurex and release a C header of structs representing their binary protocol. Unambiguous, no transcription errors from an obnoxious PDF, none of FIX’s stupid design.
It’s been an age but when I was doing connector work Eurex was so great. Everything about it technically was high quality.