spintwig Announces Custom Trade Logs

2 min read

We are excited to announce a new service: Custom Trade Logs.

Custom trade logs are an easy and affordable historical options data solution that makes backtesting accessible to all.

Consider Joey, a fictional options trader that has a trade idea involving VIX options that he would like to backtest. He’s comfortable working with spreadsheets but wants to avoid the learning curve, commitments and limitations of backtesting tools and the high costs and complexities associated with procuring, cleaning, warehousing and scanning raw options data. Joey has two options:

• hire a research firm such as spintwig to perform private, custom backtests
• order affordable, custom trade logs containing only the data he needs to do his own backtests

There are several benefits associated with doing your own backtests:

• Flexible analysis: analyze trade logs in unique ways that best meet your mandate and preferences, exceeding the capabilities and KPIs of most backtesting tools
• Improved privacy: our build-to-order trade logs default to a “daily entry” methodology, masking any order-entry filters or signals associated with your trade intent so your idea remains yours.
• Data validation: compare your results and methodologies to known and established benchmarks to help validate your calculations and establish confidence in your results.

Joey proceeds with building his own custom trade logs to backtest his VIX call strategy. Here’s how it works:

1. Joey fills out the single-leg options trade-log form and completes his purchase. He’ll receive an email receipt confirming his order details (we also have spread and strangle custom trade log forms).
2. Within two (2) business days, he’ll receive an email containing his custom options trade log. The file will be a compressed (.ZIP) text file in CSV format.

Our custom trade logs are institutional quality, with over 5,000 symbols supporting equity and index historical options markets going back to 2007. Data has a 24-hour resolution and is captured at 3:46pm ET each trading day.

The custom trade log attributes and attribute definitions are easily accessible on our methodology page. Download a sample trade log file of a daily-entry short SPY put 45-DTE 2.5-delta strat with a 25% profit taker.

We are excited to offer this new service as we continue to find new ways help people make informed financial decisions.

-The team at spintwig