Yesterday, the Kraken virtual currency exchange announced their Websocket service, providing a stream of exchange updates to its clients. Getting updated rates quickly is a good idea, so I used their API documentation and added Websocket support to the Kraken service in Valutakrambod today. The python library can now get updates from Kraken several times per second, instead of every time the information is polled from the REST API.
If this sound interesting to you, the code for valutakrambod is available from github. Here is example output from the example client displaying rates in a curses view:
Name Pair Bid Ask Spr Ftcd Age
BitcoinsNorway BTCEUR 2959.2800 3021.0500 2.0% 36 nan nan
Bitfinex BTCEUR 3087.9000 3088.0000 0.0% 36 37 nan
Bitmynt BTCEUR 3001.8700 3135.4600 4.3% 36 52 nan
Bitpay BTCEUR 3003.8659 nan nan% 35 nan nan
Bitstamp BTCEUR 3008.0000 3010.2300 0.1% 0 1 1
Bl3p BTCEUR 3000.6700 3010.9300 0.3% 1 nan nan
Coinbase BTCEUR 2992.1800 3023.2500 1.0% 34 nan nan
Kraken+BTCEUR 3005.7000 3006.6000 0.0% 0 1 0
Paymium BTCEUR 2940.0100 2993.4400 1.8% 0 2688 nan
BitcoinsNorway BTCNOK 29000.0000 29360.7400 1.2% 36 nan nan
Bitmynt BTCNOK 29115.6400 29720.7500 2.0% 36 52 nan
Bitpay BTCNOK 29029.2512 nan nan% 36 nan nan
Coinbase BTCNOK 28927.6000 29218.5900 1.0% 35 nan nan
MiraiEx BTCNOK 29097.7000 29741.4200 2.2% 36 nan nan
BitcoinsNorway BTCUSD 3385.4200 3456.0900 2.0% 36 nan nan
Bitfinex BTCUSD 3538.5000 3538.6000 0.0% 36 45 nan
Bitpay BTCUSD 3443.4600 nan nan% 34 nan nan
Bitstamp BTCUSD 3443.0100 3445.0500 0.1% 0 2 1
Coinbase BTCUSD 3428.1600 3462.6300 1.0% 33 nan nan
Gemini BTCUSD 3445.8800 3445.8900 0.0% 36 326 nan
Hitbtc BTCUSD 3473.4700 3473.0700 -0.0% 0 0 0
Kraken+BTCUSD 3444.4000 3445.6000 0.0% 0 1 0
Exchangerates EURNOK 9.6685 9.6685 0.0% 36 22226 nan
Norgesbank EURNOK 9.6685 9.6685 0.0% 36 22226 nan
Bitstamp EURUSD 1.1440 1.1462 0.2% 0 1 2
Exchangerates EURUSD 1.1471 1.1471 0.0% 36 22226 nan
BitcoinsNorway LTCEUR 1.0009 22.6538 95.6% 35 nan nan
BitcoinsNorway LTCNOK 259.0900 264.9300 2.2% 35 nan nan
BitcoinsNorway LTCUSD 0.0000 29.0000 100.0% 35 nan nan
Norgesbank USDNOK 8.4286 8.4286 0.0% 36 22226 nan
Yes, I notice the strange negative spread on Hitbtc. I've seen the same on Kraken. Another strange observation is that Kraken some times announce trade orders a fraction of a second in the future. I really wonder what is going on there.
As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address 15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.