F Charts

http://www.spacejock.com/FreechartsSE.html

http://www.spacejock.com/SEDownload.html

FCharts SE is a free stock charting software program which will import price data from a wide range of sources, displaying it as OHLC, Candlestick and Line charts. It has a number of built-in indicators (MACD, RSI, Exponential (EMA) and Standard Moving Averages (SMA) and more), or you can write your own with the inbuilt formula language and display them as standalone charts or overlays. You can also draw trend lines with a few clicks of the mouse and print or save your charts in full colour or black and white.


FCharts Pro is cheaper than alternatives because it's up to the user to source their own data.There are plenty of all-inclusive charting packages out there, but they're four or five times the price and you still have to pay for a data subscription.

So, after you've installed FCharts the first question is usually How do I set up my database? This quickstart guide will help you do just that. (95% of FCharts users live in Australia, so I'm using the ASX in this example.)

First, download and run this sample data file (Warning - this will overwrite existing data if you've created any). Make sure you install to My Documents\FCharts, or Documents\FCharts on Vista/Win7. You should end up with a folder My Documents\FCharts\Prices containing subfolders A-Z. There will also be a company2.dat file which contains all the tickers, company names, etc.

At this stage you can view charts for just about all the companies on the ASX, but the prices will be out of date.

So, the next step is to import recent price data. If you visit Speculative Trading Ideas you can download ASX data for the past 4 months. (There's a 'Historical Data' link on the main screen of their site.) If the data is packed, extract it to an empty folder. Next click Import/Export in FCharts, then Import Folder, then navigate to this folder containing the extracted data.

An alternative to STIdeas is to use Import/Export then Backfill. Set the start and end tickers to A and Z respectively, change the starting date to something just before the last price in your database, make sure the market suffix is ".ax" (including the full stop, not the quotes) and click Start. Backfill will only retrieve price data for tickers already present in your database, which is why you had to import the sample database first.

Now your charts will be up to date, and from this point you need a daily EOD file which is supplied for free by most online brokers. E.g. Comsec, NAB, etc. At the end of the trading day you can download this file and use Import/Export then Import File to bring it in. (There's a guide to retrieving and importing data from Comsec right here)

Your database should contain ASX prices for the past couple of years. But what if you want older prices? Visit float.com.au where you can download entire years at a time, from 1999 to 2009.

Finally, you might like to set up watchlists for the ASX100, ASX50 and so on. This tutorial explains how

Print this post