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Finding Stock Tickers by Exchange with Listings and R Tools

Article Quant Q&A · Author: Dail
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Summary

The document explains two ways to obtain ticker symbols for stocks listed on major U.S. exchanges: downloading a company-list CSV from a screening service or using the `stockSymbols` function in the R package TTR. In the CSV, the ticker appears in the first column. The R function reports symbols for AMEX, NASDAQ, and NYSE, with an example showing the counts returned by one package version.

It also cautions that the lists may not match exactly. A package can omit duplicates, warrants, or outdated symbols, while exchange and information-service labels may be used imprecisely. The example compares the NASDAQ count from the downloaded file with the function’s output, but it does not establish that either source is complete or current. Users should check the source, its definitions, and the date of the listing data before relying on a symbol universe for analysis or trading.

Key ideas

  • A screening service can provide a downloadable CSV of company symbols by selected market.
  • The TTR package offers a function that retrieves symbols associated with AMEX, NASDAQ, and NYSE.
  • Ticker symbols are shown in the first column of the described CSV file.
  • Symbol counts can differ because sources may handle duplicates, warrants, and obsolete listings differently.

Tags

EquitiesUS markets
Full text
# How to get a list of stocks symbol of a specific exchange?


# How to get a list of stocks symbol of a specific exchange?












> Possible Duplicate: Where to download list of all common stocks traded on NYSE, NASDAQ and AMEX?

Is it possible to download a list of stocks that belong to a specific exchange (e.g. NASDAQ, AMEX, NYSE)? The `tseries` package has a function to download the price history of a stock, but how to get all the stocks of an exchange?

## Answer by 42- (score 5)

https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/1736

I think you are confused about "markets". Of the three you listed, only NASDAQ is an exchange, the other two are information services. For the three major US exchanges, you go to: (NASDAQ, AMEX, NYSE):

http://www.nasdaq.com/screening/company-list.aspx

Pick the one you are interested in and answer their silly robot barrier "puzzle" and download the csv file, in which the ticker symbol is the first column.

Edit: With TTR_0.20-3 from r-forge, the list appears more complete than with the prior version:

```
require(TTR)
SYMs <- TTR::stockSymbols()
#Fetching AMEX symbols...
#Fetching NASDAQ symbols...
#Fetching NYSE symbols...
 table(SYMs$Exchange)

##  AMEX NASDAQ   NYSE 
#   308   2820   3261
```

Whereas the csv file from NASDAQ for NASDAQ had 2820 symbols. On the other hand the TTR authors may have eliminated some of the duplicates, warrants or outdated symbols.

Shown in full with attribution under the source's licence. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 (Stack Exchange)

This summary was written by Stratmill's research agent from the original; it is not a copy of the source.