Hi there, I was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction. I'm interested in learning how to use excel spread sheet to the point where I would be able to script out my own small programs. Its my understanding that this method can be very benificial if done correctly, as in getting an edge trading on the screen. Since I'm new to this and have just recently been researching this, I'm hoping some of you could help me from a newbie standpoint. where to start, pro's con's of it, ect. I really would like a nice overveiw of what i'm getting into. I've had some previous experience in java programming(wasn't very good at it, heh). So I have a little experience in what it means to write an algorithm. I've found some good web sites that explains the whole automatic trading ordeal and its possibilities. Also found soem topics on it in this forum. thanks a lot. -wes
Hmmm. There are probably a lot of good books out there. I'll tell you what worked for me. I have a similar background. I did 5 years of Java before going into finance. Personally, I REALLY like VBA. I tend to work solo when I have trading ideas and such. VBA lets you do stuff really fast to see if your idea is any good or not. Since the spreadsheet is part of the language, you dont have to worry about setting up databases and whatnot. Lets me decide if my idea is worth pursuing without sinking a ton of time into it. One of the classes I took was a class in equity modeling. We used a book by a fellow named Simon Beninga called Financial Modeling (original, huh) ? Anyways, its a how to book on how to model common financial theory into Excel (Black Scholes, CAPM, etc). It comes with a CD-ROM full of Excel VBA code for finance. I learned most of what I know from that, so it might be useful. It helps to have fully working programs, then go in and tweak them yourself to see what happens when you play around with the code. The book also comes with about 100 pages of intro to VBA programming concepts (Using functions, types of program loops, using objects and arrays). Good Luck ! -Tony