Freight Costs

Data

Warning!

Chris Tate and Louise Bedford now suggest that you use Beyond Charts+ as an alternative package to Metastock. If you’ve already purchased Metastock, then keep reading here.

Unlike other business ventures a trading business is not difficult to set up.You do not have to go out and look for premises for your new business,hire staff or source equipment.However,there is one tool that is vital to all traders,data.Without clean accurate data upon which to base your investment decisions your trading business will fail.

“How did I ever trade without it?”

It’s essential that your data is easy to use, quick to distribute into your charting package, and basically foolproof. To see a trader in action, updating their data, watch the brief video below. It shows how easy and quick Trading Game data is to use:

You Get What You Pay For!

The question is often raised as to why you should pay for data when it is possible to get data using the Internet for free. The answer to this is two-fold. Firstly, you either approach trading in a professional manner using accurate professional tools or you don’t. Secondly free data is not actually as free as it may seem.This statement may seem like a contradiction but consider how motivated someone who offers free data would be to maintain that data so that it was clean, accurate and reliable.

Each year on the ASX there are several hundred corporation actions that result in changes to a company’s issued capital. Each of these has to be accurately interpretedand then not only does the current price of the stock needs to be altered but all the historical prices and volume data needs to be recalculated to reflect the change in the company’s structure. In addition to this each week a further dozen will have been de-listed by the exchange or had a name or code change. New stocks that come on board
need to be identified.

Ask yourself – Would you undertake all this work for free? Then ask whether you would base your investment decisions on someone else’s free work.

To demonstrate how disastrous free data can be for the inexperienced trader consider the two charts below.

Example One.jpg

Imagine if you had gone to bed safe in the knowledge that your Incitec Pivot shares were worth $95 and woke up the next day to find they were only worth $4.30. If you had been using a free data service that did not take care with their database this is the situation that would confront you.

However, if you had data that was properly adjusted and maintained you would have realized that all that had occurred was a simple share split and you had not just suffered a catastrophic 95% loss on your investment.

Trading Game data takes all the effort of maintaining your data since we do it all for you.Everything from splits, consolidations, rights issues to the de-listing of shares is done for you automatically on a daily basis. This way you can concentrate on the business of trading and making money.

 Example Two.jpg

Key Features

Keep reading below to find out about:

Easy Installation

The installation of our data is extremely simple and only requires a few clicks of your mouse. The mechanism we use to deliver the data will mean that you are up and trading almost instantly.

If you’re setting up your data for the first time, you’ll need to read the information below carefully so you’ll understand how to install the data.

Your order will be forwarded to our data providers. They will contact you by email within 24 hours to provide you with your username/password and a link to their Downloads area. If an e-mail doesn’t appear to arrive from them –

  1. Check your SPAM folder
  2. Make sure you have provided us with your correct e-mail details
  3. Contact us to let us know by emailing 

Once inside the Downloads area, you can download the program and history installers.

For example, if you’ve
subscribed to ASX updates, download the “Trading Game Data” program
installer and the full ASX history installer.

Save both installers to the sameplace on your machine – e.g. to your Windows desktop. Then find the program installer, run it and simply follow the prompts. The program installer will recognise the history installer and offer to install the history for you as part of the process.

A short-cut icon to “Trading Game Data” will be left on your desktop. You can also access the program through Start > All Programs > Trading Applications. To update your data each day, just open the program and click the “Update” command. It’s all a very simple and quick process.

After everything is up and running, you can safely delete the downloaded installers. These may be downloaded again at any time whilst your subscription is current – for instance, in order to set up a new machine.

It’s easy and will take no time at all.

Lightning Fast Downloads and Data Distribution

Updates are achieved via the Internet by a single click on the Update command. Trading Game Data employs a series of back-up data servers in case the primary server is ever down. In the rare event that this happens it is a simple process to select a different server and begin the download process.

The speed of your data distribution will depend on your subscription level and the capacity of your computer (and also on whether or not you have real-time virus scanning enabled). A base level update (involving about 2,000 securities) may take as little as a few seconds. A full update (involving over 6,000 securities) should take, on average, a couple of minutes.

Trading Game Data remembers the date of your last update. If you are away for a period of time, the program will automatically catch up on the intervening data as soon as you click “Update”. There are no restrictions on the number of times a subscriber can access our servers.

The Trading Game Database

The Trading Game database has ASX equity prices going back to 1992 and index prices back to 1980. The US data covers a period of 50 years with data for the Dow Jones going back to its first trading day in May 1896. In addition to this we offer a survivor bias free database on the US market dating back 50 years. This database covers over 20,000 delisted securities and over 13,000 listed securities on NASDAQ, NYSE, NYSE Alternext (formerly AMEX), NYSE Arca and OTC plus a comprehensive set of market indices with over 800 indices covered. There are well over 60 million daily prices provided in the database.

The Trading Game Data databases are split up by security type, to keep things tidy. This arrangement keeps the equities folder as slim as possible, to make the task of locating the ordinary shares of companies that much easier.

Exchange-traded options, indices, interest-bearing securities and warrants each have their own folder.

Automatic Database Maintenance

It’s one thing having an accurate and self-consistent database – it’s another thing keeping it that way! Trading Game Data does your database house-keeping for you.

Maintenance is performed on a weekly basis, with maintenance files being published over the weekend to allow the house-keeping to be completed as a stand-alone task.

The following actions are performed as part of database maintenance:

  • Equity prices are adjusted for changes to a company’s capital base.
  • De-listed securities are moved from the main database into a “De-listed Securities” folder (from where you may delete them at your leisure).
  • Securities that have undergone a name or code change are refreshed to reflect the new name or code.
  • New securities that have been added to the database during the week are assigned their full names.

To see how easy this is, have a look at the video below, and you’ll see Chris Tate in action, discussing database maintenance.

Data Format

The Trading Game database is held in the MetaStockTM compatible format. This has effectively become the industry standard by virtue of the popularity of the MetaStockTM charting program.

Nearly all reputable charting and analysis packages will read the MetaStockTM compatible format, even if they employ a proprietary format as well. If your third-party software can read the MetaStockTM compatible format, it will read our data.

International Indices as your FREE bonus!

So what else can we offer you? Complete peace of mind.

Trading Game Data updates all benchmark international indices on a daily basis as a FREE bonus.

So what next?

You’re a trader. You need to be only a mouse click away from accurate, clean data. It’s essential.

Order the Trading Game data pack of your choice today, and you’ll be even closer to trading like a professional, and living life on your own terms.

Click here to choose the correct data package for your needs.

More Information

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