Options Support

Options FAQ

• How is my data delivered?

  We prefer to deliver all of our data via download. However, the size of the data files (especially for options data) may be too large for download. In such cases, data will be delivered on external hard drive boxes. A shipping & handling (S&H) fee may apply, along with a hard drive fee.

• Where can I obtain more information about Option Class Symbols?

  The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) provides details about their option class symbols on their website at www.optionsclearing.com.

• Does the options data contain trade volume information?

  Yes, our Tick Options Data (TOD) and One-Minute Options Data (OMOD) trade files provide volume for all options trades executed in a given interval.

• Does the options data contain information about the underlying symbol’s price?

  Yes, our Tick Options Data (TOD) contains bid/ask price and size information, along with the underlying symbol’s exchange and condition codes. Our One-Minute Options Data (OMOD) trade files do not contain any price information about the underlying symbol.

• What information is contained in a basic One-Minute Options Data (OMOD) file?

  The default One-Minute Options Data (OMOD) data files contain seven fields of data:
  Date
  Time
  Open
  High
  Low
  Close
  Volume
  The name of the folder in which the data files are contained contains the underlying symbol’s Company ID (this is a unique identifier assigned by Tick Data). The data’s ASCII file name contains the Class (underlying) Symbol, Put/Call Indicator, Expiration Date, Strike Price, and OPRA Code.OMOD comes to you with our TickWrite® software. Using TickWrite, you may output compressed ASCII files that contain any of the following 15 fields:
  Date
  Time
  Open
  High
  Low
  Close
  Volume
  Class Symbol
  Put/Call Indicator
  Expiration Date
  Strike Price
  OPRA Code
  Days To Maturity
  Symbol
  Company ID

• What information is contained in a basic Tick Options Data (TOD) file?

  Please download our U.S. Options File Format Guide for complete details on the fields and values contained in our Tick Options Data (TOD) files.

• Does the data contain a millisecond stamp?

  The timestamp in OPRA Options data is to the millisecond from Sep-1-2008 on.

• How can I receive data updates?

  Please call us at +1.703.757.1370 to subscribe to Data Updates.

• In what format does the options data come?

  We deliver our OPRA options data as-traded data in compressed (WinZip) text files along with our TickWrite® software that allows you to convert the as-traded data into time series of any granularity (e.g. x-ticks per bar, y-minutes per bar, etc.). The resulting outputted time series data is in comma-delimited text files.

• What if I find a problem with my data?

  Tick Data works very diligently to ensure the data is as clean and robust as possible. However, no data set is perfect. If you find any questionable anomalies, please contact our Support Desk. We will make every attempt to fix the problem.

• Is the data clean?

  Our mission is to provide clean historical intraday data. We employ several proprietary tick filtering algorithms and verification methodologies to remove or repair what we deem to be suspect ticks. Most of our data file contain both raw and filtered prices.

• How can I receive updates to the data?

  Tick Data offers daily update subscriptions for all markets (limited number of options quote data symbols) that can be retrieved automatically using TickWrite 7’s Scheduler feature. Clients can subscribe to data updates in one-year terms.Learn more about data update subscriptions

• In what time zone is the data?

  All of our data is delivered in the time zone of the instrument’s exchange. For Options, that means OPRA's native time zone, U.S. Eastern Time. Forex data is also in U.S. Eastern Time. Using one of our data tools, you can output the data in any time zone.

• What software can I use to analyze the data?

  Virtually any software that can import delimited text files can read our data (e.g. OneTick©, Microsoft Excel®, NinjaTrader®, MetaTrader®, TradeStation®, MATLAB®, etc.). If you have questions about whether or not your software can analyze our data, contact us.

• Do I need Windows® to use the data?

  No. The delimited text files (both as-traded and time series) can be used with any operating system. Likewise, our TickWrite® Web data management software is browser-based and can be used with any OS. However, if you wish to use our TickWrite® 7 data management software, it is only available for Windows® or Linux®.

TickWrite Options Support