The stock market typically offers insights into a country’s economic standing. The importance of the stock market cannot be understated; thus, the industry will employ the latest tech standards to stay ahead of the curve. The stock market represents investors and traders who make money off the stock market, creating employment opportunities.
Traders and investors leverage the information from the stock market through stock market APIs. This information helps them make critical decisions to earn money on their investments as APIs act like telephone exchanges facilitating software interaction with each other. In recent times, APIs have become the core component of software development.
Traders and investors benefit from not having to parse through thousands of information sources related to the stock market when using APIs. On the other hand, using APIs has become part and parcel of the web development scene, where developers leverage using them to customize their applications and make them more efficient.
These days the market has many stock market APIs for free that can be a game-changer to your application development. While there’s no shortage of stock market APIs, you must choose the right one to fulfill your purpose. You must keep six factors in mind before locking in on API selection.
1. Scope of Data:
APIs scour the internet and gather the requisite information from various sources. The query to an API can only ask the question; it cannot dictate which database the API will extract data from. This decision must be made by the user looking to use the API for their application or trading purpose. A developer must inspect the API for its output information because sometimes the API may return with exchange-specific output. In contrast, at other times, it may return with multiple stock exchange data. If the developer wants specific exchange data, they can choose that API; otherwise, search for an alternative.
2. Latency:
Latency refers to the time taken by an API to return the necessary information regarding a query by an application or the trader. Low latency means that the API will return the query in a shorter amount of time; meaning traders and investors will have the latest information in no time. Moreover, high latency APIs aren’t useful for developers as they will only lead to more lag when the application is querying the API for information.
3. Scalability:
The scalability of any application or program depends on its key structure or in this case, coding. The better the coding, the greater the chances that the API will be scalable and function as smoothly as on a smaller scale. While handling larger queries, some APIs may collapse, but a well-devised API will handle this pressure efficiently, thus making it an excellent choice for developers.
4. Data Source:
One of the key ingredients to an excellent API is its secure and reliable data sources. If the API is collecting data via public resources, chances are that there will be errors and omissions. Premium APIs get over this hurdle by paying the data source companies for reliable and instant data. Also, public resources are less stealthy in uploading the data to the internet, thus creating a lag which will also result in higher latency for the API. Thus, a free stock market API may be handy in many situations. Premium APIs are the way to go if you’re handling data on a large scale or require instant, reliable data.
5. Currency or Reporting:
The currency of reporting varies from API to API. In this case, developers and traders must take note of the currency the API is reporting to find a suitable match for their needs. Often, traders and investors would like to get in on global stock markets or trade in a currency different from the US Dollar. If this is the case, you must ensure that the API you’re using can convert currencies in real-time, depending on the current exchange rates of the global market.
6. Security:
The final jigsaw of the API selection puzzle is that of security. The security layers an API has is a must-know before employing any API. You can use any API you want if you’re just dabbling in software development or experimenting with various combos. However, if you’re working on a project that requires data security, you must choose a secure API that has no chance of data leakage from the API. With thousands of APIs in the market for developers to work with, you need a secure API to ensure data safety for your application’s users.
