Algo Trading Platforms

Algo trading is a new trend in India. It has made new rules compared to the traditional forms of trading and provides the traders with the speed, accuracy, and liquidity required for the trades.

Algorithmic trading is completely based on the use of complex algorithms to make trades, therefore, the sophistication and the speed of the system and algo trading platforms used are of paramount importance.

With the use of algo trading, the traders are able to trade without the intervention of human emotions and errors and the entire process of trading has become quite systematic.

The traders get a lot of liquidity in the market because algo trading helps in making large volumes of trades in fractions of seconds.

Algo Trading Platforms Review

Multiple algo-trading strategies are used by the traders to create algorithms that are efficient enough to earn profits by the process of either following trends or arbitrage or trend reversals.

Since algo trading makes use of advanced technology for its smooth functioning, it is imperative to use the algo trading platforms and tools that make the process efficient.

The algo trading platforms, tools and algo trading software must be sophisticated, fast, easily accessible and state-of-the-art. The entire premise of algo trading lies in the speed and the accuracy with the trades get executed.

In order to facilitate this function, the algo trading platforms must be very efficient so that the process of algo trading remains seamless and without any flaws.

The essential features for an algo trading platform to be excellent for algo trading are as follows:

• High Speed.
• Connectivity to various exchanges and the ability to integrate all the feeds.
• Real-time availability of the market data and company data.
• As low latency or time lag as possible.
• Provision for customization.
• Ability to backtest the historical data.
• Ability to place trades directly with the broker’s network.
• Ability to write trading programs according to the customized needs of the trader.
• A platform-independent programming language.

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Best Algo Trading Platforms

On the basis of the above-mentioned features, the best algo trading platforms in India are:

Zerodha Streak:

Zerodha Streak is an extension of Zerodha Kite, which is the exchange-approved trading platform by Zerodha. It is one of the most efficient algo trading platforms in India. After the onset of algo trading in India, about 40% of the market orders are being executed through algos on the NSE.

Algo Trading NSE has brought a huge transformation in the trading world.

This is because trading requires keeping a second by a second track of the markets which becomes humanly impossible at times and this is when the algo trading platforms come into play.

The biggest benefit of Streak is that it lets the users perform algo trade without coding. The algos can be created even without the technical knowledge of programming, just by using the simple technical indicators, entering the stop loss and profit percentage and choosing the stock to trade-in.

In terms of indicators, up to 5 conditions can be added and exit can be based on stop loss or achievement of the required profit percentage. Almost all the important technical indicators like Bollinger bands, RSI, Moving Averages and multiple chart patterns are available on this platform.

Another excellent feature of the Streak platform is a powerful backtesting engine that has the ability to create performance metrics for many stocks at a time and backtest them on the basis of maximum gains, maximum loss, average gain, average loss, etc.

This will help the trader to analyze how well his algo is going to perform.

Streak also has other excellent features like the provision of creating a custom basket of stocks, transaction tables and the ease of applying the algos to the real trades.

Also Read: Zerodha Kite Connect

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Omnesys NEST:

Omnesys NEST is one of the best algo trading platforms, provided by Thomson Reuters. It has all the excellent features of a state-of-the-art trading platform, including low latency rates and high levels of performance.

The products offered by this platform has features that are tailored to the needs of the institutional brokers, retail brokers, exchanges and proprietary desks.

The platform provides investment services, news, trading tools and trading advice inbuilt in the platform. The products offered range from various strategies like arbitrage strategies, options strategies, directional execution strategies and a direct financial information exchange (FIX) connectivity.

NEST also provides direct market access and smart order routing and multiple risk management tools. For the retail traders, NEST offers offline trading, self-trading and an online web portal, along with a mobile application to keep a track of the trades.

Another distinguishing feature of NEST is the ability to provide options for cover orders, bracket orders and smart order routing to find the best price across different exchanges and route the order for best execution. The speed, accuracy, and skills of the NEST platform are impeccable.

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ODIN:

ODIN is a flagship product of Financial Technologies India Ltd. It provides one of the most advanced algo trading platforms in India. The specific algo trading platform allows the auto-execution of the trades using the selected strategies.

There is a wide list of momentum, options, spread, and execution-based strategies to choose from and the strategies range from a single leg to multi-leg up to 6 legs.

The platform delivers high performance, speed and inbuilt intelligence to make intelligent and error-free decisions. There are multiple options to calculate the available spread and automatically revise the target spreads based on the trader’s execution plan.

ODIN platform is intelligent enough to ensure planned execution of trades using threshold and it automatically squares off the trades at the end of the day.

The value additions provided by ODIN include performing complex calculations based on the predefined parameters on a real-time basis in fractions of seconds and application of these calculations and strategies to the trades with the least human intervention.

The traders can use multiple strategies in a single application and can make accurate trades with high chances of profitability.

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AlgoNomics:

AlgoNomics is a trading platform offered by NSEIT and is one of the best algo trading platforms. The differentiating feature of the platform is its ultra-low latency levels which are beneficial for high volume trades by the investment banks, fund managers and individual algo traders.

The platform is one of the most technologically advanced algo trading platforms with an intuitive user experience and a leading user interface with multi-monitor support.

The traders can either pick the off-the-shelf strategies or create strategies of their own. There are options for risk management both pre and post-trade, along with real-time surveillance.

The platform is technically stable to create and monitor multiple trading strategies and multiple tasks can be performed simultaneously. The orders can be placed and the strategies can be managed at the same time.

An excellent feature of AlgoNomics is that the strategy parameters can be checked alongside running them and the strategies can be paused, changed, stopped or canceled while running.

The orders and their running status can be observed and amended as need be. Therefore, AlgoNomics becomes an efficient algo trading platform that provides maximum control, high speed, and leads to consistent and profitable results.

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Presto ATS:

Presto ATS is one of the most efficient algo trading platforms for Indian exchanges. This platform has the provisions for creating, testing, deploying, executing and monitoring algorithms and deals in all the asset classes available on the Indian Exchanges.

The platform is customizable and can run hundreds of algos which are developed using Presto Studio. It is advanced enough to be able to communicate and interact with multiple markets and data vendors at the same time. Presto ATS has inbuilt RMS and is FIX enabled.

The algorithms can be deployed with the Live Market Data and Direct Market Access and the platform can be operated in three modes: live trading, paper trading and backtesting. The Presto ATS platform is currently used by institutional investors but it is also gaining popularity among retail investors.

Conclusively, the efficient selection of the algo trading platform plays a significant role in the success of algo trading. It is because the success and efficiency of algo trading depend on the speed and accuracy with which the software is able to process the trades.

If the algo trading platform is not efficient, the trader with the most effective strategies and excellent timing may also end up making losses in algo trading.

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Read this review in Hindi.