| 1.
Using a new supplemental file, the BDB now contains information
about ALL
the strikes that exist for each asset. Up till now, the BDB could
only hold information on up to 14 strikes per asset (the 14 closest
to the money strikes). The expansion of available strikes should
be a help to those users who like to view a large number of available
strikes on the indexes, the QQQ’s, and other such assets.
Now that the BDB contains all available strikes, Small and Moderate
AutoStrike extents will probably be adequate in most circumstances.
Leaving the AutoStrike extents on Large will automatically define
an enormous number of options for some assets. For example, the
QQQ has options on one-point intervals from 10 to 50, plus extra
strikes at 55, 60 and 65! If you involve this many options in your
TradeFinder analysis, it may take a long time to run. If you use
DataVue, obtaining quotes on this many options places an extra
burden on your system, as well as our servers. If you use a real-time
quotes service, it would likewise be an extra burden on your own
system and theirs.
There are many assets with dozens of strikes available.
For instance, because the Russell 2000 (RUT) has traveled from
345 to 545 this
year, it still has strikes all the way down to 330. Note that the
330 calls are 214 points in the money now! To prevent such options
from filling up your Matrix and burdening the program, the first
time you run version 1.61 the software will automatically lower
any of the default AutoStrike extents from Large to Moderate. If
you disagree with this, or just to see what your settings are,
go into View | Default AutoStrike and change the Extents to Small
or Moderate.
2.
In the Quotes Display, it is now possible to make a section sort
itself by Last, Chg,
Percent Change, Name, or Volume. Just
right-click on the section header in the column you want to sort
by. That will cause the section to quickly be sorted by the column
you clicked in. You may also sort by the symbol column this way,
although this is redundant with clicking the little “A” at
the far right. We are leaving the little “A” there
for those who are accustomed to it. 3. For our India clients, the OptionVue program restricts access
to the BDB to India assets only. It does this by noticing if the
user is authorized in DataVue for India prices but not for US and
not for Australia.
4. Events scheduled to take place at regular time intervals between
certain hours every day now happen only on trading days. Previously,
they also triggered on weekends and holidays.
5. Asset files are now able to store and use monthly stock dividends.
This change was important for modeling options on the new bond-based
iShares.
6. In Price Charts,
today’s volume is shown in red now to
match today’s price bar. Also, for two of the technical indicators
displayable in the lower section (MACD and Momentum) we switched
to dynamic scaling – that is, the vertical axis re-scales
to best represent the data that is in view.
7. In the System Models dialog, the interest rate fields now accept
inputs as low as 0.1%. (Should we go ahead and allow negative numbers?)
8. Updating a stale
asset file can sometimes be a problem, because many of the options
prices being received are filtered out, resulting
in the matrix showing an “..f..” in the last, bid,
or asked fields. That happens because while accepting new options
prices, the program filters by comparing each incoming price with
that option’s fair value as previously computed and stored.
To help relieve the problem, when updating an asset file containing
prices four or more days old, the software does not apply the options
filter. Neither does the software apply the filter when jumping
back four or more days in BackTrader mode.
9. While stepping forward
through time in BackTrader mode, it was necessary to close and
re-open the Account Status window each
day in order to record that day’s account value (for the
historical performance graph). Now, each day’s account value
is recorded without having to close and re-open the Account Status
window.
10. In TradeFinder,
under the Strategies tab, we changed the name of the “Short backspread (+1 x -2)” strategy to “Vertical
ratio spread (+1 x -2)” in order to more closely follow industry
terminology. We also changed “Long backspread (-1 x +2)” to
just “Backspread (-1 x +2)”.
11. Checkboxes were added, similar to those in Survey, to the
Edit | Lookup dialog so users can search for assets in particular
countries. |