Best Finance APIs

Whether you’re an algorithmic investor looking to create a systematic edge for yourself or a provider of financial technology platforms, APIs are necessary to create the financial systems you utilize.

The Best Finance APIs:

• Best Newsfeed: Benzinga - Click here for free trial
• Best for Full-Length Articles: stocknewsapi.com
• Best for Analyst Ratings: TipRanks
• Best for Simple Coverage: Barchart.com
• Best for Earnings: Earningscalendar.net

Best Finance APIs for Newsfeeds

The following APIs are known for having amazing news coverage that allows you to make the best trades and investments.

1. Benzinga

Benzinga’s newsfeed is known for providing extensive market coverage in a timely speed. The API has no latency, the newsfeed is available via rest API, FTP, TCP, and it allows for a 1 API call per second. The website includes easy-to-use API documents as well. The API cost for Benzinga is free with your trial.

2. Stocknewsapi.com

You can see a small sample of Stocknewsapi.com data within a widget embedded on the website. On top of that, it includes some unique data fields with news headlines such as sentiment, image and even type (video or text).

The largest downside to this API is that it aggregates content from external news providers and you can only get full-length articles (which have much lower coverage and delayed headlines by a matter of hours).

Best Finance APIs for Analyst Ratings

If you're looking for analyst ratings, these finance APIs will keep you in the know.

1. Benzinga

Benzinga’s analyst ratings calendar API provides the basics of what every trader needs when it comes to analyst actions at an affordable, flexible price. The API includes the analyst name, action, price target change and the firm. For most financial publishers and platforms, this amount of coverage is perfect. The API cost for Benzinga is free with your trial.

2. TipRanks

When it comes to analyst ratings, TipRanks is the first name to come to many people’s minds, and for good reason. TipRanks’ Daily Analyst Ratings API provides comprehensive coverage on analyst actions, firms, price target changes, specific analyst names, contact information and a proprietary analyst star rating.

It allows for financial publishers to integrate an easy-to-consume widget on the website.

3. Barchart.com

Barcharts.com is the simplest coverage available. For platform providers who are just looking for standard coverage of stocks with a strong buy, moderate buy, hold, moderate sell or strong sell rating, this is your API. It provides the basic info that traders look for without extra data fields or noisy headlines.

Best Finance APIs for Earnings

API coverage isn't complete without a comprehensive earnings report. Check out these APIs for the most up-to-date information on earnings.

1. Benzinga

Benzinga’s earnings API is a quality data piece, with its earnings coverage on all U.S. equities and inclusion of quality analyst estimates to compare to actual earnings. Pricing does include flexibility, but it can be more expensive than other options. That said, the data quality and coverage exceed the competition.

Multiple data accuracy tests and relevant consensus analyst estimate data fields mean that this API is known for its data quality. The API cost for Benzinga is free with your trial.

2. Earningscalendar.net

While Earningscalendar.net is not excessively intricate, it ranks as our “best for earnings” API due to its good coverage and extremely affordable and transparent price. In this case, simplicity, affordability and transparency do prevail. Its earnings dates are indexed from multiple sources to ensure data quality. The Premium API cost for Earningscalendar.net is $50 per month.

What is a Finance API?

A simple way to grasp this concept would be to imagine you are looking at a flowing river that stretches as long as you can see.

You can see the river, you can see the water flowing in the river, but you can’t see where the water is coming from. There must be a lake or an ocean that is constantly providing water to the river, but not one that is within your sight.

That lake or ocean is the proverbial API!

Financial APIs are the back-end data that go into any financial platform that you aren’t able to see when you’re on the website or platform.

Data such as the real-time prices of stocks constantly flashing a new number or the newsfeed that instantly posts a press release at 8 a.m. on the dot are both examples of financial tools you use that are provided via API.

Types of Finance APIs

Here are a few financial data sets that you might be surprised to know are all integrated into platforms via API:

• Earnings: estimated and actual earnings per share, estimated and actual revenue, earnings-related news headlines
• Analyst ratings: analyst upgrades and downgrades with price target changes
• Dividends: all dividend distribution announcements with ex-dividend dates
• Economics: coverage of the largest market-driving economic news headlines
• Stock splits: when a company announces a split and how large the split will be
• IPOs: the price, capital raised and date for all upcoming and historical initial public offerings

What to Look for in a Finance API

Many financial data sets have become such a commodity now (pun intended) that most people don’t think twice about how they get them or where these pieces come from.

However, before you pay that shady-looking guy in the alleyway for a cheap API, you might want to check for these important factors.

Price flexibility. A good data partner will always give at least some wiggle room for you. Since APIs are high-margin products, every data provider can afford to budge at least a little to have your business. That said, lowballing your vendors could lead to them not doing business with you, so finding a healthy balance is a key to getting a good API and saving a few bucks while you’re at it.

Latency. Some data vendors add a latency (or delay) to their API data to maintain a competitive edge on their financial products. This delay can be anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes. If you don’t ask, many data vendors might sneak this little piece of information past you, so always make sure to ask about this before buying any API!

API calls allowed per minute. Another way data vendors may try to maintain a competitive edge is by limiting the amount of API calls a buyer is allowed to do per minute. This is essentially the frequency of how often you can update or request for new information. So, if you had a “live” stock quote that was only allowed to do 1 API call per minute, the quote would only update every minute. Knowing how often you can make an API call is another key to knowing how fast the data will end up showing on your platform.

Types available (TCP, Rest API and FTP). There are a few different types of data distributors that you may want to consider based on what you are looking for. The standard API is a rest API. This is the type where you need to make an API call to get real-time data (the fastest APIs typically offer 1 call per second). Looking for something even faster in sub-second speeds?

You’ll need to buy TCP data. TCP does not require that the user makes a request (like an API call) in order to get the data. It pushes the data out to you as close to instantaneously as possible. On the other hand, if you don’t require fast data for the data set you’re looking for, then an FTP may be the route for you. FTPs typically provide end-of-day data.

Examples of this could be fundamental data like P/E, P/S or EV/EBITDA. Financial data pieces like this don’t typically need to be updated throughout, so having this by the end of the day is more than sufficient. Buying FTP can be much cheaper, too, for this reason.

How to Build a Brokerage

Building a brokerage should start with an idea of how you will make money, the investments you plan to make and the sorts of customers you wish to attract. Yes, you should be licensed by FINRA, SIPC and/or NASAA, but you also need a solid plan that investors or partners can get behind. You should be licensed to sell investment products, and your principals/advisors should also be licensed. However, your business model speaks to your projected success.

As you open your business, you want the website or mobile app to offer APIs like those listed above. Decide which investment products you prefer to focus on. Some companies focus on crypto or forex while others trade stocks and purchase bonds. You are free to expand your offerings at any time, lower fees, offer deposit bonuses and try other features that will attract customers.

Finally, you can expand your workforce by offering training and licensure support for brokers or advisors. You might invest in a call center, offer financial advisory services, etc. Consistently test the growth of your business against your plan so you know which step to take next.

Choose the Best Finance API

Looking for API provider that follows a few key metrics like price, flexibility, latency, API calls allowed per minute, types available and data quality.

If you buy multiple APIs from a single vendor, there is typically more price flexibility if they offer package data deals. Take a look at our top picks to choose the best finance API.

Found your perfect API and ready to start investing? Check out our top picks for the best stock split calendars and the best online stock brokers.

Frequently Asked Questions