Trading View: An Impressive Platform for Technical Analysis

Trading View Free Edition

Trading is expensive. There are broker commissions, hidden account fees, and don’t forget about subscription costs for financial newsletters and charting software. I’ve embraced a very lean trading model where I don’t pay anything for trades, research, or software. A few tools make this possible. In a previous post, I provided a detailed review of the revolutionary commission-free trading app, Robinhood. In this post, I’ll discuss an amazing tool called Trading View. I’ve been using the free version for a few months now, and it’s been a great user experience so far.

Noteworthy Features

1. Entirely Web Based. Trading View is built on bleeding edge web technology, and there’s no download required. You simply need a modern browser. ie. You can’t use Netscape Navigator.

2. Real-time exchange data. The free version includes real-time data from BATS which is accurate enough for a casual investor like myself. Access to real-time data from other exchanges is available using their $9.95/mo ‘Pro’ plan.

3. Notifications. The platform offers the ability for users to create custom price alerts. These can be set up as sophisticated conditionals using a tool like IFTTT. You can even elect to receive alerts via text message.

4. Custom Scripting Engine. It’s easy to write, publish, and share your own technical analysis scripts. Documentation here.

5. Extended Trading hours (requires ‘Pro’ version).

6. Built-in Technical Indicators. There are hundreds. You can easily toggle commonly used indicators like RSI and Bollinger Bands, or you can opt for highly specialized charting scripts like Moon Phases.

7. HTML5 Widgets. I’ve embedded a chart below as an example. Click the blue popup button to get a more feature-rich view.

8. Open API. If you want to host your own version, you can leverage the API to connect your own data feed to the independent charting library. There’s also fully featured terminal trading.

…AND, they now support charting for Bitcoin!