Credentials

Obtaining credentials

1. Obtain Login Credentials:

   • You will need your E-Trade username, password, and account number.

2. Obtain API Credentials:

   • Log into the E-Trade Developer website and log in with your E-Trade login and password.

   • Select your account from the Accounts menu.

   • Select Create Key as the “Operation Type” and then click the Get Sandbox Key button.

   • The website should then show you your consumer key, consumer secret, sandbox key, and sandbox secret.

   • Copy and paste these somewhere as you will need to save them in step 4.

3. Obtain API Cookie:

   • You will need to contact E-Trade customer service to obtain a cookie that will need to be passed to the API so that their servers recognize your automated trading program, otherwise it will be blocked.

   • The best way to do this is to call the 1-800 number listed on the E-Trade website “Contact Us” page.

   • Tell them you are calling to request an API cookie for your Python automated trading program.

   • They will then give you instructions on what you need to do.

   • It might take a couple days to verify you and obtain the cookie and call center wait times may vary.

   • It is typically best to call around 8AM EST on business days.

4. Save your credentials:

   • Open your terminal or command prompt and activate the etradebot environment if you have not already.

   conda activate etradebot
   

   • Run the following commands to save your credentials to keyring:

     • Enter your E-Trade consumer key when prompted.

     keyring set etrade consumer_key
     

     • Enter your E-Trade consumer secret when prompted.

     keyring set etrade consumer_secret
     

     • Enter your E-Trade sandbox key when prompted.

     keyring set etrade sandbox_key
     

     • Enter your E-Trade sandbox secret when prompted.

     keyring set etrade sandbox_secret
     

     • Enter your E-Trade web username when prompted.

     keyring set etrade web_username
     

     • Enter your E-Trade web password when prompted.

     keyring set etrade web_password
     

     • Enter your E-Trade account ID when prompted.

     keyring set etrade account_id
     

     • Enter your E-Trade cookie when prompted.

     keyring set etrade etrade_cookie
     

5. Obtain your Account ID Key:

   You will need to use your credentials to obtain the accountIdKey for the account you want to use:

   • Open your terminal or command prompt.

   • Navigate to the etradebot root directory.

   cd etradebot
   

   • Start the Python interpreter.

   python
   

   • Import the list_accounts module. This line of code will log in to your E-Trade account assuming you saved your credentials correctly in step 4. If this is your first time logging into your account with the API, you will be prompted to enter a two-factor authentication code sent to your mobile phone by E-Trade.

   >>> from utils.list_accounts import get_account_list
   

   • Run the get_account_list function.

   >>> get_account_list()
   

   • This will output a pd.DataFrame of your accounts (accountId is the account number) and their account ID keys, for example:

                        accountIdKey        accountDesc accountMode accountType
   accountId
   840104290  JIdOIAcSpwR1Jva7RQBraQ         INDIVIDUAL      MARGIN   BROKERAGE
   

   • Copy the account ID key for the account you want to use and then use the following command to save it, replacing 'JIdOIAcSpwR1Jva7RQBraQ' with your account ID key.

   >>> import keyring
   >>> keyring.set_password('etrade', 'accountIdKey', 'JIdOIAcSpwR1Jva7RQBraQ')
   

6. Once finished, verify that your credentials are stored:

   >>> from utils.credentials import show_credentials
   >>> show_credentials()
   

   • This should output your credentials, for example:

   consumer_key: 282683cc9e4b8fc81dea6bc687d46758
   consumer_secret: 2FrC9scEpzcwSEMy4vE7nodSzPLqfRINnTNY4voczyFM
   sandbox_key: 3TiQRgQCRGPo7Xdk6G8QDSEzX0Jsy6sKNcULcDavAGgU
   sandbox_secret: 7RrC9scEpzcwSEMy4vE7nodSzPLqfRINnTNY4voczyFM
   web_username: my_username
   web_password: my_password
   account_id: 840104290
   etrade_cookie: {'name': 'SWH', 'value': 'GRDKRORF5-he5abv74-25oj', 'domain': '.etrade.com', 'secure': True, 'httpOnly': True}
   account_id_key: JIdOIAcSpwR1Jva7RQBraQ