Project: Unofficial Robinhood (Web) App Development

When I need more info and a substantial decrease in latency when making trades.*

The lack of non-mobile trading options on Robinhood has led to a large amount of unofficial implementations (most on Github) that allow you to trade while away from a smartphone (other than using an emulator), however a majority of them cover only basic functions to do trading (such as buy/sell stock, get quote information). Seeing an opportunity to enter into the field of web application development, I decide to join in as well, believing I can bring something new to the table.

My first open-source (and real C#) project starting my Github programming portfolio involves use of the console to assist with active trading utilizing the RH API. You still have to manually enter your orders, but it's able to enter positions faster (mainly by skipping the Trade Preview step).

This program was based on other open-sourced apps that used the API; I don't know why most of these implementations have been largely abandoned in recent times, but I guess I'm about to find out.

Github source for the above available here.

Please note: This project exists mostly as a coding portfolio piece; I only have part-time working experience but completing this might get me much closer to getting my foot into the door somewhere.

Progress:

This project is divided into four segments:

• Robinhood API docs: A forked version of an existing RH API documentation with more endpoints filled out and more focused on consistency.
• RobinhoodNET: A C# .NET API that allows easy access for most parts of the RH API.
• rh-cli: command line interface to get various quote information, buy/sell stocks, and a few other things. Stock quotes are updated once per second while placing an order.
• rh-alt: Alternate* Web Client interface (might be coded with a combination of Angular.JS, Javascript, HTML5 canvas, d3.js, and more)

Joann Fabrics Closing Sale

While in the area, I noticed a sign that Joann Fabrics was closing and that all of its items were on sale. Normally I would have at least a paragraph or two about how I went there in order to get a few supplies years ago (typically perler beads for several projects) and how they had weekly 40% off an item coupons. However... they are just relocating.

I did go in and half its shelves were empty. There's a sign at the front saying that the sale will end at the end of June, when they finish opening up the new store. They specified an address where they were moving to, which I could just simply look up.

I didn't have to. It's much closer - as in next door.

I still don't know why a sell-off is needed for moving into an adjacent building, but I'm guessing it's due to both a renovation and moving into a space half the size of the original building. (On a similar note the Wal-Mart in Lodi moves next block in July, but its new location stands to be one of the largest in the US.)

Marie Callender's - Stockton

This will be the last time I see the Marie Callender's building in Stockton (or at least what's left of it anyways) after it closed down last January.

It apparently will be replaced with Chick-fil-A over here; I have previously heard about it but never gone over there, so it might be something new to try when they open.

Krispy Kreme Superhero Day

On April 28th, Krispy Kreme has a Superhero Day promotion where you get a dozen glazed doughnuts for free if you buy a dozen on April 28th. There's a doughnut box to match, with the appearance of a comic book.

This is the first time I've actually heard about it, and there's nothing on the official website about this year's event at the time of writing, but it can be assumed to be valid since they ran this in previous years.

Red Robin Black and Bleu Burger

A true knife-and-fork burger... once you ask for them.

The Black and Bleu burger at Red Robin sounded like a good idea at the time when it came to finding something new to eat, as I've almost always gotten burgers with swiss and portabello mushrooms at restaurants and never had blue cheese on a burger before.

It's not as salty as other burgers I've been normally eating at fast food restaurants, it's much worse.

At 4,496 mg worth of sodium as is, this beats the Saltiest Burger in 2015, as well as being way more sodium that I'm willing to handle in one day, let alone one meal. I had to split the sandwich into two parts as a result. Note that the sodium count does not include those from the endless fries.

Remind me to order this burger without the sea salt and pepper, as it effectively cuts the sodium down by more than half, and there's a supply of that on the table to season it to taste.

Inverse Crude Oil

Falling too fast.*

It seems like investing in inverse crude is always a bad time; it keeps going up, and a day after buying, it drops sharply. I might have enough to put in a few more shares at this point but no more.

My stance on crude oil going down to sub-26 still stands (at least for the next few months), particularly because of increased efficiency of getting that oil, and that no one, especially smaller companies, can keep that much crude oil forever due to storage costs (the price has even gone negative in some cases).

Then there's the possibility that even if all countries agree to reduce oil production, someone might break it to gain increased market share...

Unlike the above screenshot, I was unable to buy DWTI for whatever reason so I went for SCO (which instead has a -17% drop in this case). This is probably better since it drops less overall during a period of high volatility and they are cheaper allowing me to average down for less. I don't have the ability nor the funds to buy commodity futures / options contracts yet but I would use them if I could.

I've seen this volatility before when I had money in bitcoin a year ago so I'm used to it; unlike the former this is an ETF so I can't margin call on this one. The best bet would to be buying shares when the RSI for crude oil futures is high... and hodl.

UPDATE: On Feb 9th, crude price oil went down very quickly below 28, and I have since sold those shares for a profit noting a possible rebound.

Robinhood Stock Trading

Still waiting, but no longer.

After hearing about Robinhood on a Reddit post in /r/investing back in December that allows you to trade stocks without commissions, I decide to sign up for it at the start of the year in order to get into more diversified stock trading without having to pay a lot from commissions.

What appears to be an easy entrance instead may turn out to be a high barrier to entry. Despite the official FAQ stating approval can take up to five business days, it was at least two weeks after signing up and stuck with an 'account pending' (with the buy button on stocks visible but disabled) before allowing me to proceed. It doesn't appear to be limited to myself, though, as a post shows.

I was eventually approved and was able to start trading at the beginning of February. Initially, trading was an issue as my tablet died and I didn't have a smartphone* available to get on; however I was later able to do so via an Android emulator (such as Bluestacks).

I obtained API access later that year and built my own program to execute trades when away from a mobile device and to focus on implementing the things I wanted to see. As of August 2016 over half of my trades are done off-app.

I opened an account on another brokerage generally as a backup, which got approved quickly, so I'll keep that one mainly for some other trades (such as leaps and options) and for other things RH does not yet support.

Would like to see:

• Updates the GUI based on actual current time, not the time on the Android device
• Show max shares to buy on order window instead of tap
• Buy up to X stocks over a period of time during the day below a set price
• Tap / confirm = quick market order (in the official app to a certain extent)
• Toggle line indicators on placed orders and/or breakeven points
• Notify at certain price (other than +/- 10%)
• Quick Stock Lists (useful if watching a lot of stocks)
• Trailing stops
• IOC, FOK, or pegged orders

Notes:

• The time between stock price updates is 5 seconds (and 15 during the order entry window). It takes at least 10 to buy or sell shares.
• Place any market orders made off trading hours as day orders so you don't get unexpected trades; market orders have a 5% collar and they're not 'immediate or cancel' (at least at the time of writing) so they won't trigger if the stock difference between closing and next day's opening is too high (ex. NUGT Feb 11, 2016, +20.7% increase from previous close), but they aren't cancelled either, so the queued order might trigger unexpectedly at some point in the future if the stock slumps. You also cannot tell what price the market order was made at (nor does the email) should it still remain active so you'll need to write it down somewhere.
• It seems like Twitter mentions to @AskRobinhood or through other social media channels are more likely to go through than standard emails if there is no reply from the latter.
• After account approval, it is strongly recommended you delete all messages related to any information you attached and sent to them via email, particularly since they now exist as web links and not attachments.
• You are more likely to get High Volatility Protection warnings when you start a day with a low amount of cash and your portfolio mainly consists of high volatility and/or penny stocks.