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My understanding is that Quantopian has no interest in being a platform for HFT. It's there to democratize trading strategies and test them in a sound way. They

My understanding is that Quantopian has no interest in being a platform for HFT. It's there to democratize trading strategies and test them in a sound way. They do a lot to have a good backtesting platform and clean the data that is available in the platform. If I wanted to automate a strategy, I'd have to figure out the Robinhood API and basically recreate what they have. Instead, I can use their platform, their backtests, their free data, and build strategies that efficiently lose money. I think the other goal being that if you create a profitable strategy, you can enter it into competitions, trade with other people's money, and make a profit. I think the platform is a value add, I have an account and use the research notebooks. Some day when I more spare time I'll make some trading algorithms.

SirLJ 9y ago
The main problem with Quantopian is that the data missing especially for delisted stocks, here are some examples you can test yourself: AA, CWH, NIHD, PANL, HTZ, DSL - I have a whole list I found very fast, just imagine what other mistakes could be there... And the other problem is that they are my competitor, so I would never give them my trading strategy or ideas I am testing at the moment...
- TACIXAT 9y ago
  The trading strategy stuff has been brought up before. They say when evaluating algorithms they only look at the alpha, beta, etc. and not the algorithm itself. While the system can see what you're running, I think they work pretty hard to let your code be yours. I'm definitely not very advanced in algorithmic trading, so I see how there could be some data issues that I wouldn't come across.
- dsacco 9y ago
  This is false. Quantopian sources their historical and real time data from Nanex, and the data is explicitly free of survivorship bias (i.e. they maintain data for delisted equities). I don't know what you verified, but it directly contradicts my own experience and the FAQ: https://www.quantopian.com/faq#data-sources https://www.quantopian.com/faq#data-sources To your second point, as another commenter said Quantopian doesn't see your algorithm unless you give them permission, as outlined in the terms of service (which are very readable, by the way). NB: I am not unaffiliated with Quantopian and don't use the platform for my own trading, but I have tried it out before.
  - SirLJ 9y ago
    Please go back and check and you'll se the data is missing for the symbols stated above, and I am sur for many more based on my limited test... everyone can see I am right by trying to request the data, nothing false about that...
    - dsacco 9y ago
      > everyone can see I am right by trying to request the data, nothing false about that... Oh, they can? Well that's funny, because I just went onto Quantopian and checked for myself. http://imgur.com/a/VwMUJ http://imgur.com/a/VwMUJ http://imgur.com/a/VV68C http://imgur.com/a/VV68C Gee, would you look at that...they are there. This took me all of five minutes. Do you have anything else I can easily disprove while I'm at it?
      - SirLJ 9y ago
        The problem is the data is missing for specific dates... I just can imagine what else is missing or it is wrong...
        evanpw 9y ago
        What dates do you see missing data for?
        dsacco 9y ago
        This is really trying my patience. You made a clearly incorrect claim without mentioning specific dates and challenged me to disprove it. When I did disprove the claim, you shifted the goalposts with this backpedaling remark about how only specific dates are missing. You continue to make these claims and put the burden of proof on everyone else because you can't be bothered to defend them when you're challenged. I'm not searching for a needle in a haystack for you. Make a falsifiable claim, and make the entire claim, with the specific dates you're talking about, or stop this astroturfing against Quantopian and QuantConnect that you're doing.
pmart123 9y ago
I understand they don't, but the execution options could matter. Retail brokerage platforms don't actually send your orders to the exchange: http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/nn/legal_compliance/important_notices/order_routing.html http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/nn/legal_compliance/impo.... If your turnover is very low, and your trade size is small, this shouldn't make an impact in liquid products, but only having market and limit orders can be very limiting. Granted, IB is probably the best retail platform, but it's not perfect. Even a smart beta strategy would likely have 4X turnover to an index. I do hope they succeed, and perhaps they begin offering a more open, premium offering to compete with Capital IQ, etc. I just have a hard time seeing how operating as a fund-of-funds essentially is a good business model considering the CAPEX they have to build the software. I could see it as a way to build, test, and then offer a premium back-testing platform or portfolio analysis/attribution tool once they've ironed out the bugs. There's a lot more money in that business than in fund-of-funds.
cityhall 9y ago
It sounds like day trading for script kiddies. There's no way to develop or execute a sound strategy with that level of access. It's like a slot machine tournament. No one has an edge but some percentage of people will do well enough over a finite period to convince them to put real money behind their lucky algorithm.

SirLJ 9y ago

The main problem with Quantopian is that the data missing especially for delisted stocks, here are some examples you can test yourself: AA, CWH, NIHD, PANL, HTZ, DSL - I have a whole list I found very fast, just imagine what other mistakes could be there... And the other problem is that they are my competitor, so I would never give them my trading strategy or ideas I am testing at the moment...

TACIXAT 9y ago
The trading strategy stuff has been brought up before. They say when evaluating algorithms they only look at the alpha, beta, etc. and not the algorithm itself. While the system can see what you're running, I think they work pretty hard to let your code be yours. I'm definitely not very advanced in algorithmic trading, so I see how there could be some data issues that I wouldn't come across.
dsacco 9y ago
This is false. Quantopian sources their historical and real time data from Nanex, and the data is explicitly free of survivorship bias (i.e. they maintain data for delisted equities). I don't know what you verified, but it directly contradicts my own experience and the FAQ: https://www.quantopian.com/faq#data-sources https://www.quantopian.com/faq#data-sources To your second point, as another commenter said Quantopian doesn't see your algorithm unless you give them permission, as outlined in the terms of service (which are very readable, by the way). NB: I am not unaffiliated with Quantopian and don't use the platform for my own trading, but I have tried it out before.
- SirLJ 9y ago
  Please go back and check and you'll se the data is missing for the symbols stated above, and I am sur for many more based on my limited test... everyone can see I am right by trying to request the data, nothing false about that...
  - dsacco 9y ago
    > everyone can see I am right by trying to request the data, nothing false about that... Oh, they can? Well that's funny, because I just went onto Quantopian and checked for myself. http://imgur.com/a/VwMUJ http://imgur.com/a/VwMUJ http://imgur.com/a/VV68C http://imgur.com/a/VV68C Gee, would you look at that...they are there. This took me all of five minutes. Do you have anything else I can easily disprove while I'm at it?
    - SirLJ 9y ago
      The problem is the data is missing for specific dates... I just can imagine what else is missing or it is wrong...
      - evanpw 9y ago
        What dates do you see missing data for?
      - dsacco 9y ago
        This is really trying my patience. You made a clearly incorrect claim without mentioning specific dates and challenged me to disprove it. When I did disprove the claim, you shifted the goalposts with this backpedaling remark about how only specific dates are missing. You continue to make these claims and put the burden of proof on everyone else because you can't be bothered to defend them when you're challenged. I'm not searching for a needle in a haystack for you. Make a falsifiable claim, and make the entire claim, with the specific dates you're talking about, or stop this astroturfing against Quantopian and QuantConnect that you're doing.

pmart123 9y ago

I understand they don't, but the execution options could matter. Retail brokerage platforms don't actually send your orders to the exchange: http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/nn/legal_compliance/important_notices/order_routing.html http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/nn/legal_compliance/impo.... If your turnover is very low, and your trade size is small, this shouldn't make an impact in liquid products, but only having market and limit orders can be very limiting. Granted, IB is probably the best retail platform, but it's not perfect. Even a smart beta strategy would likely have 4X turnover to an index. I do hope they succeed, and perhaps they begin offering a more open, premium offering to compete with Capital IQ, etc. I just have a hard time seeing how operating as a fund-of-funds essentially is a good business model considering the CAPEX they have to build the software. I could see it as a way to build, test, and then offer a premium back-testing platform or portfolio analysis/attribution tool once they've ironed out the bugs. There's a lot more money in that business than in fund-of-funds.

cityhall 9y ago

It sounds like day trading for script kiddies. There's no way to develop or execute a sound strategy with that level of access. It's like a slot machine tournament. No one has an edge but some percentage of people will do well enough over a finite period to convince them to put real money behind their lucky algorithm.