Getting Started

Currently Alpaca and Interactive Brokers are available as a brokerage services. This quickstart is about using Alpaca services. After the quickstart will be instructions specific to Interactive Brokers.

1. Install the package on your computer

pip install lumibot

2. import the following modules:

# importing the trader class
from lumibot.traders import Trader
# importing the alpaca broker class
from lumibot.brokers import Alpaca

3. Create an Alpaca paper trading account: https://app.alpaca.markets/paper/dashboard/overview (you can also use other brokers, but Alpaca is easiest to get started with)

4. Copy your API_KEY and API_SECRET from alpaca dashboard and create a Config class like this:

class AlpacaConfig:
    # Put your own Alpaca key here:
    API_KEY = "YOUR_ALPACA_API_KEY"
    # Put your own Alpaca secret here:
    API_SECRET = "YOUR_ALPACA_SECRET"
    # If you want to go live, you must change this. It is currently set for paper trading
    ENDPOINT = "https://paper-api.alpaca.markets"

5. Create a strategy class (See strategy section) e.g. class MyStrategy(Strategy) or import an example from our libraries, like this:

class MyStrategy(Strategy):
    def initialize(self, symbol=""):
        # Will make on_trading_iteration() run every 180 minutes
        self.sleeptime = "180M"

        # Custom parameters
        self.symbol = symbol
        self.quantity = 1
        self.side = "buy"

    def on_trading_iteration(self):
        self.order = self.create_order(self.symbol, self.quantity, self.side)
        self.submit_order(self.order)

6. Instantiate the Trader, Alpaca and strategy classes like so:

trader = Trader()
broker = Alpaca(AlpacaConfig)
strategy = MyStrategy(name=strategy_name, budget=budget, broker=broker, symbol="SPY")

7. Backtest the strategy (optional):

backtesting_start = datetime(2020, 1, 1)
backtesting_end = datetime(2020, 12, 31)
strategy.backtest(
    YahooDataBacktesting,
    backtesting_start,
    backtesting_end,
    parameters= {
        "symbol": "SPY"
    },
)

8. Run the strategy:

trader.add_strategy(strategy)
trader.run_all()

And that’s it! Now try modifying the strategy to do what you want it to do.

Here it is all together:

from datetime import datetime

from lumibot.backtesting import YahooDataBacktesting
from lumibot.brokers import Alpaca
from lumibot.strategies.strategy import Strategy
from lumibot.traders import Trader


class AlpacaConfig:
    # Put your own Alpaca key here:
    API_KEY = "YOUR_ALPACA_API_KEY"
    # Put your own Alpaca secret here:
    API_SECRET = "YOUR_ALPACA_SECRET"
    # If you want to go live, you must change this. It is currently set for paper trading
    ENDPOINT = "https://paper-api.alpaca.markets"


class MyStrategy(Strategy):
    def initialize(self, symbol=""):
        # Will make on_trading_iteration() run every 180 minutes
        self.sleeptime = "180M"

        # Custom parameters
        self.symbol = symbol
        self.quantity = 1
        self.side = "buy"

    def on_trading_iteration(self):
        self.order = self.create_order(self.symbol, self.quantity, self.side)
        self.submit_order(self.order)


trader = Trader()
broker = Alpaca(AlpacaConfig)
strategy = MyStrategy(
    broker=broker,
    parameters= {
        "symbol": "SPY"
    })

# Backtest this strategy
backtesting_start = datetime(2020, 1, 1)
backtesting_end = datetime(2020, 12, 31)
strategy.backtest(
    YahooDataBacktesting,
    backtesting_start,
    backtesting_end,
    parameters= {
        "symbol": "SPY"
    },
)

# Run the strategy live
trader.add_strategy(strategy)
trader.run_all()

Or you can download the file here: https://github.com/Lumiwealth/lumibot/blob/master/example_strategies/simple_start_single_file.py

Adding Trading Fees

If you want to add trading fees to your backtesting, you can do so by setting up your backtesting like this:

# Create two trading fees, one that is a percentage and one that is a flat fee
trading_fee_1 = TradingFee(flat_fee=5) # $5 flat fee
trading_fee_2 = TradingFee(percent_fee=0.01) # 1% trading fee

# Backtest this strategy
backtesting_start = datetime(2020, 1, 1)
backtesting_end = datetime(2020, 12, 31)
strategy.backtest(
    YahooDataBacktesting,
    backtesting_start,
    backtesting_end,
    parameters= {
        "symbol": "SPY"
    },
    buy_trading_fees=[trading_fee_1, trading_fee_2],
    sell_trading_fees=[trading_fee_1, trading_fee_2],
)