The most frequent request I’ve received over the past 9 months is for a version of Better Volume for NinjaTrader. NinjaTrader is a great platform, with a great following and I am trying to support it as fully as I can. Sadly, however, volume traded at the bid or the ask is not readily available – as it is in TradeStation. Therefore, Better Volume for NinjaTrader has required a workaround that is not ideal and has a number of drawbacks:
- Computationally Intensive: The indicator loads 1 Tick data into memory in order to calculate the volume traded at the bid and the ask. This makes the indicator computationally intensive, charts slow to load and limits the indicator to a maximum of 5 to 10 days worth of data. In some cases it has caused NinjaTrader to crash. However, the indicators do not have to run in real-time to work and don’t "lose" the calculations when they are closed (as in some other bid/ask NinjaTrader indicators).
- Settings Not Saved: Because Better Volume has been coded as a Strategy within NinjaTrader, changes to color and width settings are not saved and re-set to the default values when charts are re-loaded.
- Does Not Support Interactive Brokers (IB) Data Feed: If you use the IB data feed for NinjaTrader this indicator will not work properly. The IB data feed is not complete and only reports about one third of all Ticks. This works fine for minute or hourly bars but is worthless for Tick charts or calculating volume traded at the bid or the ask. I’d recommend upgrading to the Zen-Fire or eSignal data feeds.
- No Two Data Feeds Are Ever The Same: I know they should be, but real life isn’t like that. As a consequence, you will never get the Better Volume indicators to match up exactly using different data feeds or platforms. Having said that though, Better Volume will get the big picture right between platforms and help you analyze the volume traded.
- Best on OHLC Charts: The Better Volume indicators for NinjaTrader look best on Open/High/Low/Close charts. If you use candlestick charts you may be disappointed.
- Not Free: The Better Volume indicators for TradeStation are free. However, there is a charge for the NinjaTrader versions. This is to cover the costs and time I have incurred in having the indicators translated. This might change in the future.
NinjaTrader Version 7 may fix a number of these problems and a more efficient implementation may be possible. As soon as NinjaTrader Version 7 is available, I will get my NinjaTrader programmer to see if improvements can be made. Existing customers who have bought the Better Volume indicators for NinjaTrader will be able to upgrade to any new versions for free.
As you can tell, I’m quite apprehensive about releasing these indicators. But so many subscribers have asked for them, I’d prefer to offer them with these caveats clearly stated, rather than just abandon the project. If you’re still interested, then please click the Add to Cart button below or return to the Better Volume Indicator feature article.
Better Volume for NinjaTrader $67 (USD)
