Trading Bitcoin on Weekends

news-quantiacs

As many users pointed out, Bitcoin trades 24/7 and price swings are frequent on weekends. We decided therefore to replace the current BTC Futures with the spot BTC price, which you will be able to use also on weekends.

Do not worry about your past submissions: they will be kept running and take part to the 1st BTC contest in parallel to the new ones.

And for this contest we are raising your submission cap from 5 to 15, so that you can submit more spot systems in addition to the Futures ones.

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Photo by Bermix Studio on Unsplash

Sheikh

@news-quantiacs
But I want to trade only the BTC Futures. And I want to be able to backtest my BTC Futures algo on Quantiacs.
This change has disrupted all of my BTC Futures algos.

It is not realistic to trade the Bitcoin spot in the real world marketplace:

In order to start trading Bitcoin spot, investors must first set up a digital wallet with online platforms such as Coinbase or Kracken. This process can be difficult for the non tech-savvy or those unfamiliar with the crypto landscape.
Account Security Concerns: Web-based cryptocurrency exchanges are potentially more susceptible to technical errors and security concerns than well-established & regulated financial hubs such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
Tax Challenges: Due to the nature of cryptocurrency and how it is treated for tax purposes, complications can arise when processing taxes on crypto gains & losses.

It is easier and more realistic to trade the BTC Futures:
Trading BTC futures affords the same ease-of-access as other derivative products from the CME. Existing futures traders can seamlessly start trading BTC futures.

Also you cannot short the Bitcoin currency spot. So a Bitcoin currency spot algo can only go Long.

Please watch this video
https://ninjatrader.com/blog/why-trade-bitcoin-futures-vs-the-spot-market/

You made a change that affects quants who do NOT want a change. Maybe you should think about having both options: BTC Futures and Bitcoin spot.
Please re-instate the BTC Futures also.
Thanks.

Sun-73

Hi there,

Is the sample period used to evaluate the new dataset (BTC spot) the same (that is, since 2014-01-01)?

Thanks!

Sun-73

Hi there,

Another question about the new Bitcoin spot data: Should we use the code lines below to import the data? Or there is a new way to do that?

def load_data(period):
data = qndata.cryptofutures.load_data(tail = period, dims=("time", "field", "asset"))
return data

In respect to the competition "type", will it be called "cryptofutures" or there is a new name for it?

Many thanks again!

support

@sun-73 yes, the period is the same. Note that also the past Futures BTC data were effectively spot prices most of the time, as we were patching the Futures data with the spot data.

support

@sun-73 The call is the same, and the competition type is the same.

support

@sheikh Thank you for the comments.

The BTC spot we are using are daily data, and open/close/high/low are computed by matching the opening and closing time of the BTC Futures contracts. As we are working with daily resolution, we believe the spot BTC is ok for the current contest. Having the weekend data at disposal, signals can be built by using more information. Moreover, the previous time series were built matching the past spot data with the short futures data.

This change is not disruptive, as old algorithms developed on the BTC Futures will still run on the BTC Futures. You pointed in another thread the change in the leaderboard: many thanks, please allow us to check and fix it.

Most of the quants requested this change, so we went for it. Maybe in the future we will allow for both options, but please note that the BTC Futures have a short history, so they will have anyhow to be patched with spot data. Thanks for the suggestion.

orange.salmon

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