Investors FastTrack

Quality Data for Investing Strategies

FNUs (FastTrack Native Units)

Overview

Import your own data into FT Cloud or FastTrack.

If FastTrack’s database does not include a certain dataset… ie your personal portfolio, private stock, specific oil index, etc, you can import your own. This is done with an FNU file.

When FNU files are properly formatted and placed in the fnu folder (by default C:\FT\ folder), FT Cloud will recognize FNUS as if they were in/part the standard database.

File Format

An fnu is a comma delimited text file with the following format:

Line 1: Ticker
Line 2: Name
Line 3: Date, closing price, 0
Line 4: Date, closing price, 0
Line 5: Date, closing price, 0
Line 6: Date, closing price, 0
etc...

Click here to download an example of FNU of General Electric

Distributions/Adjustments

The third value (the 0 in the above example) denotes a distribution/adjustments. This value corrects for any distributions, withdraws, additions, etc of the data set.

For example, if you’re modeling your own portfolio, lets say you start March 2018 with $1,000, on March 15th you add $2,000, and there is a 0% return on the account for the month.

Without making an adjustment, the raw data would show a 200% gain for the month.

(3000-1000)/1000 = 200%

To correct, the FNU line for the 15th should appear: with a -2000 in the last position. See the example data below:

MY$
My Data Source
3/29/2018,3000,0
3/28/2018,3000,0
3/27/2018,3000,0
3/26/2018,3000,0
3/23/2018,3000,0
3/22/2018,3000,0
3/21/2018,3000,0
3/20/2018,3000,0
3/19/2018,3000,0
3/16/2018,3000,0
3/15/2018,3000,-2000
3/14/2018,1000,0
3/13/2018,1000,0
3/12/2018,1000,0
3/9/2018,1000,0
3/8/2018,1000,0
3/7/2018,1000,0
3/6/2018,1000,0
3/5/2018,1000,0
3/2/2018,1000,0
3/1/2018,1000,0

Notes

  • FT Cloud can handle only month end values. It will auto adjust for any market day that isn’t included in the FNU.
  • Creating an FNU in excel excel is fine. Just save the excel file as a csv file, then change the file extension from csv to fnu. Also, make sure the date is in a MM/dd/yyyy format.
  • When using month end only FNUs, go to the lower right corner of of the login tab, click “use only month end data.” To get meaningful correlation and beta values, you must adjust the entire FT Cloud database to month end.
  • You must keep this data in the FNU file current yourself. If you are missing data from these files, then FT Cloud will display a flat line on the chart for the periods missing.
  • You can’t do is display data outside the data range in the main FastTrack database. Dates before the beginning of the database or after the date of the last online update will be ignored.