If you read my posts on how I trade, you know I use three different sources for gaps - Briefing.com, Prophet.net, and the gap list from my RealTick trading platform.
As others have noted, Prophet seems to have problems with consistently producing valid output from scans. It is disappointing, as they have the potential to be the best of the three sources. But, they have problems every few weeks - sometimes producing no output, and sometimes producing output that does not match the criteria from the scan. And, their technical support is often frustrating and slow to respond.
Someone asked for other sources to find gaps in the "Comments" section of an earlier post. Feel free to post your ideas here.
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Tags:
Trader-X, Stocks
Mentoring: The Key to Developing as a Trader
3 days ago
13 comments:
Clear Station has a decent free source........Sometimes they come out a little later then I woul like.
http://clearstation.etrade.com/cgi-bin/events?Cmd=techev
That sucks as I would guess your blog has driven a lot of business to Prophet. I noticed the scans Friday and today were not working. Still, I think I get enough from Briefing and RT.
Thanks 5150.. I'll look into Clearstation.
Barb, yes it does majorly suck that prophet is so unreliable. How do you like Realtick? I have Etrade Pro (java platform) and it's ok I guess for the kind of trades I do. Do you get the gap scans from the Oz scanner? How does it compare to prophet? Finally, do you think RT is worth the $150-$200/ month?
Sorry for all the questions!
X, enjoy your vacation and sip on a mojito for me!
dave, RT has built-in screens for gap up and gap down - I have never used the Oz scans.
Regarding price, it is actually 260, but it costs nothing if you make a certain amount of trades which I easily do every month. I think it is 50, but check their website for specifics.
I use Street Smart Pro's stock screener to search for gaps. SSP has several built in gap screens, but you can easily write your own screen with it. I wrote a simple one that has about 6 criteria (volume, minimum price, gap size, etc.) to look for gap plays. So far my problem isn't finding them, but playing them. I don't believe there is a charge for SSP, just need to open a Schwab account. If there is a charge, 30 trades per quarter would eliminate it and get your commissions down to $9.95.
Scottrade is fine: Elite and Streaming quote platforms have most up/down, etc which are free along with Level II(I don't use). Island is free. Again most up which is usually gaps too. Premkt also which is great...all gaps. No scans.
INET Top list can be used as well.
http://data.inetats.com/ds/data/toplist/index.jsp?rows=100&width=555&tabs=true&links=false&filter=all&html=false&ah=false&sort=tradedshares&order=desc
I use this with INET. Click "Most Active" and the top most active are usually gappers.
Have a great vacation X, it is well deserved. Thanks for a wonderful blog.
Whoops - here is the link that should have been in my previous post:
http://www.archipelago.com/
Prophet customer service blows. I gave up on them a while back. For me, the built in gap lists in realtick work. I look at inet too in the morning.
Realtick seems to be a popular choice. I was reading up on them at their website. For those that use RT, do you guys use the RT pro with order entry and a brokerage affiliate on their site?
Thanks for all those that have given suggestions!
Regarding RealTick, yes...I use TerraNovaTrading.
Yahoo Finance Stock Screener actually works well even though it's Java. Criteria > Share Performance > Gap vs Yesterdays Close > points or %.
Glenn
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