Using a Forex Trading Simulator in Excel

In my last post I showed you how to use the Deriscope Stock Trading Simulator Excel spreadsheet to place simulated BUY and SELL market orders on US stocks traded on IEX (the Investors Exchange). In this post I will guide you through another Excel spreadsheet called DsTradingSimulatorFX.xlsm that you can also download for free. This new spreadsheet allows you to place simulated BUY and SELL orders on specific currencies based on real time bid/offer quotes supplied by the TrueFX live feeds provider. As usually, the only prerequisite is that you have previously installed the free Deriscope Excel Add-In – downloaded from the same site as above - that equips your Excel session with a wizard that allows you to fetch live data from various providers and also perform various financial calculations. Continue reading "Using a Forex Trading Simulator in Excel"

Using a Stock Trading Simulator in Excel

As I promised you in my previous article I am back with a review of a Stock Trading Simulator that works in Excel and does not suffer from the mentioned drawbacks that hamper all other available free simulators. Continue reading "Using a Stock Trading Simulator in Excel"

DeGiro – Vorsicht vor Währungswechselkosten beim AutoFX

DeGiro ist wohl der günstigste Broker in Deutschland. Allerdings muss man auch bei DeGiro aufpassen. Handelt man auf US-Börsen (und viele [quasi]-kostenlosten ETF sind dort handelbar), fallen die Währungswechselgebühren an! Schlimm ist, dass die nicht explizit ausgewiesen werden! Continue reading "DeGiro – Vorsicht vor Währungswechselkosten beim AutoFX"

letYourMoneyGrow.com Wishes You Happy New Year

Year 2017 was exciting. Markets grew but were very hard, so even Einstein (although he made 30%) says he failed to beat Mr. Market this year. The big question is how 2018 will be, esp. because the market has not seen a correction for a long time. Neither we know the answer but our goal is not to predict the future but rather to help you analyze what may happen. Understanding your own risks and how the numerous rascals may cheat you is essential in trading and investing because there is generally no profit without risk but there are a lot of (idiosyncratic) risks without profit!
We summarize which such risks we have recognized and will continue doing it in 2018. 
letYourMoneyGrow.com helps retail investor to protect themselves against rascals
Continue reading "letYourMoneyGrow.com Wishes You Happy New Year"

Building QuantLibXL in Visual Studio 2017

QuantLibXL (Excel QuantLibAddin) provides a [limited subset of] QuantLib functionality directly in Excel. However, its development follows the development of QuantLib with a lag, e.g. currently the last modified date in project repository is 2017-05-02. I tried to build QuantLibXL with currently latest version of the Visual Studio (success) and to bind it to the latest version of QuantLib (no way).
Continue reading "Building QuantLibXL in Visual Studio 2017"

Should I use a Trading Simulator to learn how to trade?

Have you ever thought of being a trader?
I mean trading things like stocks, currencies, options or anything else that you can buy and sell almost instantly - typically online - by pressing a button and not illiquid assets, such as houses or antique furniture.
Wouldn’t it be great to get some sense of what real world trading looks like before setting up an account with an online brokerage firm and putting your own money on risk?
Continue reading "Should I use a Trading Simulator to learn how to trade?"

The Mon(k)ey Value of BitCoin

The joke about monkey for $10, $20, promise to pay $50, which is currently getting very popular in the Russian segment of Facebook, is not new. It was initially attributed to the Wall Street. However, we decided to re-tell it, because the allusion to BitCoin is even stronger.
Once upon a time in a village in India , a man announced to the villagers that he would buy monkeys BitCoins for $10. Continue reading "The Mon(k)ey Value of BitCoin"

Zinsen gibt es: in der USA

In Deutschland gibt es seit Jahren keine [Anlage-]Zinsen. In EU-Raum bieten zwar die langfristigen Spanischen oder Italienischen Staatsanleihen ca. 3% Rendite an (und die Griechen versprechen sogar ca. 5%), ist diese Risikoprämie wohl nicht umsonst. Darüber hinaus gibt es nicht für jedes EU-Land entsprechenden Anleihen-ETF, auf jeden Fall nicht unter gebührenfreien ETFs von DeGiro.
Gleichzeitig bietet die USA langfristig fast 3% p.a. an und man kann mittels iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (ticker TLT) einfach (und durch DeGiro sogar gebührenfrei) investieren. Die Währungsrisiken betrachten wir bei jetzigem Dollarkurs eher als Währungschancen. Die von Fed angekündigte Zinserhöhung ist wohl schon im Kurs berücksichtigt.
Continue reading "Zinsen gibt es: in der USA"

FinTech-Days Stuttgart – Schwabenland wacht auf

Baden-Württemberg (und insb. das Schwabenland) ist die reichste Region Deutschlands. Jedoch sind wir im Sinne von FinTech (noch) nicht führend. Dank Stuttgart Financial, Börse Stuttgart, L-Bank, VentureZphere und zahlreiche Sponsors und Teilnehmer holen wir nach. Continue reading "FinTech-Days Stuttgart – Schwabenland wacht auf"

QuantLib for Mere Mortals – Insights from QL User Meeting 2017

We have already used QuantLib at letYourMoneyGrow.com several times, in particular to provide a helpful scenario simulator for option traders. QuantLib User Meeting 2017, in which I also took part, provides insights on how to make QuantLib even more accessible for the "mere mortals".
Continue reading "QuantLib for Mere Mortals – Insights from QL User Meeting 2017"