I use MS 8.0 with Reuters end of day data. I use the Explorer to scan the markets for stocks to trade. Problem is, the software limits you to 6,000 stocks per folder, so the obvious thing to do is have 1 folder for NYSE, etc, which is a nuisance. I want everything in 1 folder for easy navigation. Thing is, more than half the stocks I have no use for - low volume, penny stocks, etc. Is there a way to filter for volume or price within the Downloader so only the ones I want are received? I don't need to download 10k issues if only 2 or 3000 meet my search criteria. Downloader lets you choose by ticker symbol and that's useless of course from a screening standpoint. I'm a new user of MS so maybe there's something simple I'm overlooking. Thanks in advance.
I haven't used the Downloader for a while so perhaps I am mistaken, but I do not think you can filter like that with the downloader (unless you can import a list of tickers into the DL .. in that case you could do a scan for what you want). In my experience, trying to only download the stocks you want -- ie. active stocks -- quickly will turn into more trouble than it is worth. It is better to just use minimum criteria in your explorations. Have you looked at another quoting platform? If you use TC2000 or QP2 you can scan the database within those programs and then export out only active stocks ... that would solve your "all in one directory" issue/desire ... (I think they are both cheaper than Reuters as well)
Here's what to do: 1. In Downloader, create 2 folders, one for NYSE and one for Nasdaq. Put in the appropriate symbols, and download data (at least 2 years is good). 2. Create an exploration that searched for you basic critria of price, volume, etc. Have this exploration search the symbols in both the NYSE and Nasdaq folders simultaneously. 3. Copy the results of the exploration to an excel spreadsheet. 4. Copy the symbol column to a new text file, and give it a ".sym" extension (instead of ".txt"). 5. Move this .sym file to the appropriate place where the Downloader looks for files. 6. In Downloader, create a new folder, only this time get the symbol list from your .sym file (it should appear in the dropdown menu). 7. After you've created this new folder of symbols, you need to run Downloader on it so you get the back data on this custom symbol list. Done! Now you have a folder with both NYSE and Nasdaq symbols that only meet your basic criteria. In the future, when doing explorations, just target the custom symbol folder. Note that some stocks will fall into and out of spec over time, so you may want to repeat the process every month or so. If you have any specific questions about this process, refer to your manual or contact tech support. MetaStock has an excellent customer support team to help you with these types of issues.
Martin, thank you a great deal. I've only been using MS for about a week and this makes total sense. I never thought to let Explorer do the filtering. Best regards