Thursday, March 28, 2024

MetaStock Software Review

If you want to get serious about trading stocks, you need to invest in a stock analysis software. Stock analysis software can help you learn how to identify and adapt to market trends, back test strategies to view success rates, and design comprehensive trade or investing plans.

While stock analysis software won’t turn you into an instant pro, it will help you incorporate science and logic into online trading. As a result, you’re less likely to rely on emotions like hunches, guesses, or fear to make trades, improving your odds of success.

MetaStock offers some of the most advanced stock analysis software and tools on the market. Understanding the services each company offers can help you invest in the right stock software for your needs, making you a better trader, and increasing your chances of success.

Who is MetaStock for?

MetaStock is a charting software tool that aims to take the guesswork out of trading. MetaStock’s software analyzes stock markets at the sector, industry group, and security level, providing traders with a systematic approach for trading securities such as stocks, options, commodities, forex, and futures. Founded in 1982, MetaStock’s platform not only provides market analyses but also allows private and professional traders to access dozens of stock exchanges across international markets.  

In short, MetaStock is an excellent tool for self-directed traders of all levels who want access to real-time news and high-quality technical analysis.  

MetaStock Fees and Commissions

MetaStock’s most popular software platforms are MetaStock, MetaStock Pro and XENITH. In addition to purchasing software, you have the option to purchase additional subscriptions and add-ons, allowing you to customize your research and analyses.

Below are a few of MetaStock’s most popular software, subscriptions, add-ons and its fees. 

InstrumentFees
MetaStock D/C$499
MetaStock DataLink All-Regions Subscription$1,369/year
MetaStock Pro$1,395
MetaStock Pro Subscription$1,080/year
XENITH$1,620/year
XENITH New York Stock Exchange Add-On$3.57/year
Fee correct as of 15/10/2020

While MetaStock’s fees may look high at first glance, there also are no additional hidden fees such as per-trade fees. What you see is what you get. Additionally, your ability to customize your subscriptions and add-ons can give you a significant advantage as you trade across markets.

MetaStock Research Offerings

MetaStock’s software offers a host of tools called PowerTools. PowerTools provides professional analyses to private traders. You can either use PowerTool’s pre-built systems to determine patterns in the stock market or create your own system to find a specific pattern of your design.

Within PowerTools you’ll find:

  • Explorer: Scans the market to filter and sort securitiesShows buy and sells signals based on your criteria
  • Systems Tester: Allows you to backtest your strategies to see how it would have performed over time
  • Expert Advisor: Generates buy or sell signals based on your system’s selected criteria
  • FORECASTER: Uses technology to help you see a clearer picture of the future Sets more precise stops and profit targets
  • XENITH: A professional-level system that provides real-time news, data, and analysis designed to work with MetaStock Pro


MetaStock’s PowerTools allow you to analyze and rank thousands of securities, back-test multiple strategies, gain insights from industry experts, and design your own criteria.

Fundamental Scanning and Screening

As mentioned MetaStock is owned by Thomson Reuters, who are without a doubt the biggest and best provider of real-time news and market analysis. They also have an incredible database of global fundamental data, not just on companies but countries, economies, and industries.

The filtering and scanning possibilities are endless. We would like to see better integration within the MetaStock suite, bringing together the fundamentals and the technical analysis to enable better charting and technical analysis on fundamentals. However, the wealth of data is first class.

Using Refinitiv Xenith you can see a really in-depth analysis of company fundamentals from debt structure to top 10 investors, including level II market liquidity.

MetaStock + Refinitiv Xenith News & Social

News Service

MetaStock XVI has full Refinitiv Xenith (previously Eikon) integration with institutional level news, analysis, and outlook.  This is the fastest global news service available on the market including translations into all major languages.  Reuters also provides TV news coverage through smartphone and smart TV applications, it is after all the largest news agency in the world.  Along with the package you get Reuters Insider alerts which are exclusive content and research provided by the expert analysts on the financial network team.

Special News Features

Core features include detailed financial snapshots of a company. In the image below you see the Refinitiv Xenith Streaming News Screen for Netflix (Ticker: NFLX). Take a look at the attention to detail here and the amount of original news coming in from the Reuters Network, you will get this news before anyone else. Included in Refinitiv Xenith you also get stock quotes, charts, detailed Analyst Estimates, and a full listing of all financial details and SEC filings, complete with upcoming events listings so you are prepared for action.  Thomson Reuters as you can imagine covers everything including stock, options, bonds, futures, FX, and macroeconomic news and data.  An unparalleled source of information.

MetaStock Refinitiv Xenith — News & Research Software Platform

The platform itself is very easy to use as MetaStock has placed an emphasis on the user experience and workflow.  You can have multiple workspaces for multiple monitors and save each workspace seamlessly for reuse.  Of course, the software is available on all devices from PCs to smartphones and TVs.

Thomson Reuters the king of the real-time newsfeed and global market data coverage is the owner of MetaStock, so you get the entire wealth of knowledge included in the package.  This should not be underestimated.

Technical Analysis

Forex forecasting based on sentiment is a feature that is absolutely exceptional. Never mind the broadest selection of technical analysis indicators on the market today. MetaStock is one of the best software for technical analysis.

MetaStock takes a clean sweep when it comes to Charting covering all the core chart types, but also includes, Point & Figure, Equivolume, and Market Profile charts. When it comes to indicators, MetaStock has 300+ different types, including Darvas Box and Ichimoku Cloud. MetaStock will also help you develop your own indicators based on their coding system.

Finally, MetaStock racks up a perfect score on the drawing tools section, which includes Gann, Elliot Wave, and Fibonacci tools.

metastock review

Stock Systems and Backtesting

Another area where MetaStock excels is what they call the expert advisors. MetaStock harnesses a huge amount of inbuilt systems that will help you as a beginner or intermediate trader understand and profit from technical analysis patterns and well-researched systems.  This is really a key area of advantage.

As you launch MetaStock you will be presented with the power console. This enables you to quickly select what you want to do. Select System Test and you will have access to 58 different systems you can backtest. In the example below, we selected the Equis — MACD Expert System, and we ran in on the entire Nasdaq 100.

After 60 seconds backtest completed and presented me with a list of every buy or sell trade and of course the drawdown on the portfolio chart that you can see above. You can click through to any trade to see the background to the trade, size of the trade, duration and profit or loss.

MetaStock harnesses a huge amount of inbuilt systems and Expert Advisors that will help you as a beginner or intermediate trader understand and profit from technical analysis patterns and well-researched systems. This is really a key area of advantage.

Of course, the inbuilt systems are not going to make you super-rich, the reason you want to backtest and develop your own winning system is to get an edge in the market. With some scripting or programming skills, you will be able to achieve this with MetaStock. If you do not, you can ask MetaStock or one of a huge number of MetaStock Partners to assist you in building your system.

metastock backtesting

There are also many premium stock trading systems for MetaStock sold by their partners and usually backed up with training and webinars to support the clients.

Fundamental Scanning and Screening

As mentioned MetaStock is owned by Thomson Reuters, who are without a doubt the biggest and best provider of real-time news and market analysis. They also have an incredible database of global fundamental data, not just on companies but countries, economies and industries.

The filtering and scanning possibilities are endless. I would like to see better integration within the MetaStock suite, bringing together the fundamentals and the technical analysis to enable better charting and technical analysis on fundamentals. However, the wealth of data is first class.  Using Refinitiv Xenith you can see a really in-depth analysis of company fundamentals from debt structure to top 10 investors, including level II market liquidity. 

MetaStock Forecaster Capability

The biggest addition to the MetaStock arsenal is the forecasting functionality which sets it apart from the crowd. By selecting Forecaster from the power console, you can simply select one or more stocks, ETF’s or currency pairs and click forecast.

metastock review

You are then presented with an interactive report which enables you to scan through the many predictive recognizers which help you understand the basis for the prediction and the methodology.

MetaStock Review Summary

All in all a top class showing from MetaStock, simply put one of the best packages available.

Our personal recommendation for an investor or trader is to combine the MetaStock & Refinitiv Xenith Packages together.  The depth of fundamental research and news in Refinitiv Xenith is staggering and the in-depth analysis, backtesting, and forecasting in MetaStock is industry-leading. If $199 for the Xenith + MetaStock Package is too much, then fear not. If you simply want the end of day data and all the MetaStock functionality the price starts at a reasonable $22 per month. You can even by one-off licenses if you prefer.

If you are looking for something without all the backtesting and forecasting and the better ease of use, then TradingView is the better option and has better prices. Read our Complete Stock Charting Analysis Software Review to find out what is best for you.

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