Has anyone here actually used Python code to make an investment decision?

Just wondering if there is more than just hype around it? There used to be a time that you could scrape data that was useful but all websites nowadays block them, so I struggle to find any good use for coding when making an investment decision. Would love to know if there are others who have different opinion on this?

17 Comments
 

Since I am in high school I am just a retail trader but I use python for making investment decisions by using it to check correlation between stocks and to make sure my securities are uncorrelated. I also use it in order to have a good standard deviation across my portfolio. Lastly, I used python to make a more advanced/effective screener than just using a regular screener.

 

Not sure where did you get the impression that systematic strategies on either Python or other programming languages are hype...

If your statement was correct, then I guess all systematic funds like RenTech, DEShaw, PDT, 2Sigma are also hype.

Nowadays, more and more funds (including discretionary ones) require analysts to know how to code in Python (P72 non systematic side, etc).

 

For typical financial modeling, Excel is the go-to choice, given how intuitive it is in that context. Python helps with other tasks, such as:

  • process "dirty" data: less processed data -> more likely there is alpha.
  • process big data: there is a certain limit that Excel can't process a data set efficiently, so Python (or any scientific programming language) is more suitable here.
  • apply heavier statistical/machine learning models: this may not apply to fundamental analysts but if there is a need then Python is again more suitable. 
  • etc
 

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