Option Alpha Trading Platform Review 2021: Learn About Automated Trading Strategies
GOBankingRates Score
-
Features
5.0
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Usability
5.0
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Education
5.0
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Availability
1.0
Pros
- Zero coding skills are required. Drag and drop controls make configuration a breeze.
- Bots automate the entire trading strategy.
- Customizable controls to minimize risk for each bot.
- Bot templates to help you get started.
- Minimizes the impact of emotional, biased, or reactionary trading decisions.
- There is a community of traders behind the platform that share ideas.
- You can access free trading courses, ranging from beginner to expert topics.
Cons
- The company recently launched a new version of the platform, and there is currently a waitlist to get access. With hundreds of thousands of people on the waitlist, it might take a while for you to get in.
- Currently, the platform only supports integration with Ameritrade. However, they are working on integrations for both TradeStation and Tradier. If you don't have a brokerage account with one of these providers, you won't be able to use the automated trading capabilities.
What Is Option Alpha?
Option Alpha seeks to empower traders with simple and powerful trading tools. The company provides a platform for traders to research, backtest strategies and trade automatically.
Currently, over 15,000 active bots are running inside the platform. The company boasts over 860 bot templates. The platform’s bots monitor over 24,000 active, open positions.
How Does It Work?
The platform helps traders backtest and automate trading strategies.
You can choose from a library of bot templates to get started. The platform and other traders provide these templates. You can customize the bot for your needs and put it to work.
Here are a few examples:
- Earnings IV Crush
- Range Breakouts
- Pre-Earnings Run
With the interactive interface, you can use simple natural language to tell the bots what to look for, how to enter and exit positions and more.
The bots make data-driven decisions in milliseconds, which reduces the chance for human error and lets you focus on what’s important to you.
Membership
The platform’s new version is currently in the beta stage, with no public pricing information for memberships. You can only access the platform by signing up for the waitlist, which now has more than 250,000 people waiting.
The company will be soon offering at least three subscription plans: Lite, Pro and Elite.
The Lite plan is a starter package for simple trading strategies. You’ll have access to a handful of bots. This plan is perfect for new traders or those with smaller accounts.
The Pro plan is for traders who want to fully automate their trading portfolio. This plan lets you run many bots at once and gives you access to the backtester tool.
The Elite Plan is for experienced traders who need even more bots, power and capital limits. This plan offers the most bots and best automation features.
Features
Option Alpha comes with many excellent features for traders.
Bots
The core feature of the platform is the Bots. You can start with templates or create your own. These bots contain the rules that drive your trading strategy automation. The best part of this feature is that it requires zero coding skills. You will never have to learn how to code anything to use it.
Bots execute faster to market conditions than you ever could. Bots allow you to instantly test your actions to confirm their effectiveness.
Option Alpha has a proprietary technology called SmartPricing that uses timed intervals and adjusts pricing dynamically to maximize your trades. This technology evaluates bid-ask spreads in real-time and doesn’t chase the market.
Flexible risk controls allow you to minimize the amount of risk each bot takes on. You can also set position limits for the day or in total.
Integrations
Option Alpha has partnered with top brokers in the industry to deliver automated trading capabilities. The current integration list is not extensive, but it is growing. Currently, Ameritrade is the only active broker integration. However, agreements have been made with Tradestation and Tradier, with comprehensive integrations coming soon.
The company provides several ways for users to request integrations for other brokers, including Tastyworks, Interactive Brokers and Robinhood. They are hopeful to have integrations with them soon.
Templates
Bot templates are very helpful ways for new users to get started with automated trading. The platform currently offers over 850 templates.
Here are some of the strategies they cover :
- Stocks and options
- Bullish, bearish or neutral
- Hedging
- Active
- Event-based
- Trend or momentum
- Statistical or technical
- Earnings and more
Backtester
The Backtester tool allows you to assess the performance of strategies based on the market’s historical performance. This feature will enable you to test strategies before live trading them.
Here are a few features of the tool:
- Allocation optimization
- Multiple testing durations
- Adjust trade frequency
- Performance ratios
- Win/loss metrics
- Compare multiple scenarios and more
Community
One of the best features of the platform is the active community. Option Alpha provides a place for traders to come together, share ideas and get answers.
Watchlist
The Watchlist enables you to track your favorite stocks and ETFs. You can scan your watchlists for various movements, including momentum, volatility, earnings and more. The platform also has curated watchlists to help you quickly identify opportunities.
University
Option Alpha University is one of the best features of the platform. Here you will find self-paced guided courses to teach you how to trade and use the platform’s automation tools. The company also offers both live and on-demand training sessions. The Handbook acts as a digital encyclopedia for everything related to training.
You will also have access to research, a podcast, a library, and a help center for everything you need to succeed with the platform.
Customer Service
The customer support team is always available to help, and they provide several ways of reaching out for support. You can send them mail, call and leave a message, fill out a web form or report a bug.
Is It Right for You?
Choosing a trading platform is a very personal decision. Is Option Alpha a good fit for you?
If you’re looking for a way to backtest and automate your own trading strategies, Option Alpha is the perfect platform. If you’re looking for someone else to manage your money for you, it might not be a good option.
If you want a platform to help minimize emotional, biased, or reactionary trading decisions, then this is an excellent choice for you.
FAQ
Here are the answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about Option Alpha.- How much does the platform cost?
- The company is still finalizing pricing for its membership tiers. They have said there will be zero upfront costs to join, however.
- What kind of data does the platform use?
- Option Alpha reviews and streams real-time consolidated data with a 99.98% uptime.
- What brokers does the platform integrate with?
- Currently, the platform integrates with TDAmeritrade (thinkorswim). More integrations are coming soon, which include TradeStation, Tradier, tastyworks, Interactive Brokers and Robinhood.
- How secure is the platform?
- The Option Alpha bot ecosystem is hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS) in the United States. In addition, the platform makes use of a Virtual Private Cloud, the highest levels of TLS browser encryption and multiple tiered firewalls.
