How do I run this loop to download data from yahoo finance?

%Code to Get Matrix

fid=fopen('C:\Users\Laurentiu Galan\Desktop\Tickers2.csv');
C = textscan(fid, '%s');
fclose(fid);

%Grab First Value (Just as check)
thisval=(C{1});

% Calculate Number of Tickers
D=size(thisval);
NumTick=D(1,1);

%Calculate Loop to download tickers
  for i:Numtick             <--------------Problem
  thissym=?????????         <--------------Problem
  thisurl = strcat('http://ichart.finance.yahoo.com/table.csv?s=', thissym, '&d=10&e=8&f=2011&g=d&a=0&b=1&c=2000&ignore=.csv');
  thisdata=urlread(thisurl);
  thisfilename = strcat(thissym, '.csv');
  outputfile = strcat('C:\Users\Laurentiu Galan\Desktop\tickoutput\',thisfilename);
  thisfileid=fopen(outputfile, 'wt')
  fprintf(thisfileid, '%s\n',thisdata)
  fclose(thisfileid)

How do i make thissym a variable that I can loop to download the data from yahoo finance? Each one of the values in thisval is a ticker.

I really appreciate your help if you can help me out with this!!!

Answer 1

[Fangjun Jiang]

for i=1:NumTick
thissym=thisval{i};

To learn more, see the help

help for
help cellstr
help catch
help continue

[Laurentiu Galan]

I'm impressed Fangjun. Two more issues and I should be done for the night-

Sometimes I get an error if a ticker does not exist. Like ABSDD45. How do I tell matlab to skip that value and go on to the next one.

My second question is more complex. I have 23,000 tickers. Is there a way to use this approach using a faster method?

[Fangjun Jiang]

If the symbol doesn't exist, the urlread() will cause an error. You do this to avoid the whole program breaks down. Follow the help leads in the answer to understand the use of for, continue, cell array, and try-catch.

try

thisdata=urlread(thisurl);

catch

continue;

end

[Fangjun Jiang]

You want to save the data to each .csv file according to the symbol name. I don't see any way that you can avoid the for-loop.

[Laurentiu Galan]

thanks fangjun. You solved the question at hand. I am still getting an error related to illegal use of the word catch.