Quantopian's community platform is shutting down. Please read this post for more information and download your code.
Back to Community
Trading costs

Newbie here.

So as far as I understand, trading costs are one of the main limitations on algorithmic strategies.

Have these been estimated in the strategies here?

If not, could this be done in a fairly approximate and simple way, by just introducing a penalty proportional to the number of trades?

Starting here for example https://www.quantopian.com/posts/momentum-trade?c=1

4 responses

Hello Eoin,

See the help page regarding commissions. The line looks like this (for no commissions):

set_commission(commission.PerShare(cost=0))  

Presumably, cost is in dollars.

Grant

Hi Eoin,

This may sound over simplified, but I'll say it anyway. If the algo doesn't work without the commission paid, it for sure will not work with the payments. This actually means you can test on this basis (at least working without commission) and use this idea in algos that consume the trading cost.

If you don't specify a commission, your backtest defaults to $0.03 per share.

Disclaimer

The material on this website is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell, a solicitation to buy, or a recommendation or endorsement for any security or strategy, nor does it constitute an offer to provide investment advisory services by Quantopian. In addition, the material offers no opinion with respect to the suitability of any security or specific investment. No information contained herein should be regarded as a suggestion to engage in or refrain from any investment-related course of action as none of Quantopian nor any of its affiliates is undertaking to provide investment advice, act as an adviser to any plan or entity subject to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended, individual retirement account or individual retirement annuity, or give advice in a fiduciary capacity with respect to the materials presented herein. If you are an individual retirement or other investor, contact your financial advisor or other fiduciary unrelated to Quantopian about whether any given investment idea, strategy, product or service described herein may be appropriate for your circumstances. All investments involve risk, including loss of principal. Quantopian makes no guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of the views expressed in the website. The views are subject to change, and may have become unreliable for various reasons, including changes in market conditions or economic circumstances.

Also, we allow you to specify a model for price slippage in execution. The details are covered in the slippage section of the help docs.

Disclaimer

The material on this website is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell, a solicitation to buy, or a recommendation or endorsement for any security or strategy, nor does it constitute an offer to provide investment advisory services by Quantopian. In addition, the material offers no opinion with respect to the suitability of any security or specific investment. No information contained herein should be regarded as a suggestion to engage in or refrain from any investment-related course of action as none of Quantopian nor any of its affiliates is undertaking to provide investment advice, act as an adviser to any plan or entity subject to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended, individual retirement account or individual retirement annuity, or give advice in a fiduciary capacity with respect to the materials presented herein. If you are an individual retirement or other investor, contact your financial advisor or other fiduciary unrelated to Quantopian about whether any given investment idea, strategy, product or service described herein may be appropriate for your circumstances. All investments involve risk, including loss of principal. Quantopian makes no guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of the views expressed in the website. The views are subject to change, and may have become unreliable for various reasons, including changes in market conditions or economic circumstances.