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AlterLab-Academic-Skills alterlab-alpha-vantage

Part of the AlterLab Academic Skills suite. Access real-time and historical stock market data, forex rates, cryptocurrency prices, commodities, economic indicators, and 50+ technical indicators via the Alpha Vantage API. Use when fetching stock prices (OHLCV), company fundamentals (income statement, balance sheet, cash flow), earnings, options data, market news/sentiment, insider transactions, GDP, CPI, treasury yields, gold/silver/oil prices, Bitcoin/crypto prices, forex exchange rates, or calculating technical indicators (SMA, EMA, MACD, RSI, Bollinger Bands). Requires a free API key from alphavantage.co.

install
source · Clone the upstream repo
git clone https://github.com/AlterLab-IEU/AlterLab-Academic-Skills
Claude Code · Install into ~/.claude/skills/
T=$(mktemp -d) && git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/AlterLab-IEU/AlterLab-Academic-Skills "$T" && mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && cp -r "$T/skills/finance-economics/alterlab-alpha-vantage" ~/.claude/skills/alterlab-ieu-alterlab-academic-skills-alterlab-alpha-vantage && rm -rf "$T"
manifest: skills/finance-economics/alterlab-alpha-vantage/SKILL.md
source content

Alpha Vantage — Financial Market Data

Access 20+ years of global financial data: equities, options, forex, crypto, commodities, economic indicators, and 50+ technical indicators.

API Key Setup (Required)

  1. Get a free key at https://www.alphavantage.co/support/#api-key (premium plans available for higher rate limits)
  2. Set as environment variable:
export ALPHAVANTAGE_API_KEY="your_key_here"

Installation

uv pip install requests pandas

Base URL & Request Pattern

All requests go to:

https://www.alphavantage.co/query?function=FUNCTION_NAME&apikey=YOUR_KEY&...params

import requests
import os

API_KEY = os.environ.get("ALPHAVANTAGE_API_KEY")
BASE_URL = "https://www.alphavantage.co/query"

def av_get(function, **params):
    response = requests.get(BASE_URL, params={"function": function, "apikey": API_KEY, **params})
    return response.json()

Quick Start Examples

# Stock quote (latest price)
quote = av_get("GLOBAL_QUOTE", symbol="AAPL")
price = quote["Global Quote"]["05. price"]

# Daily OHLCV
daily = av_get("TIME_SERIES_DAILY", symbol="AAPL", outputsize="compact")
ts = daily["Time Series (Daily)"]

# Company fundamentals
overview = av_get("OVERVIEW", symbol="AAPL")
print(overview["MarketCapitalization"], overview["PERatio"])

# Income statement
income = av_get("INCOME_STATEMENT", symbol="AAPL")
annual = income["annualReports"][0]  # Most recent annual

# Crypto price
crypto = av_get("DIGITAL_CURRENCY_DAILY", symbol="BTC", market="USD")

# Economic indicator
gdp = av_get("REAL_GDP", interval="annual")

# Technical indicator
rsi = av_get("RSI", symbol="AAPL", interval="daily", time_period=14, series_type="close")

API Categories

CategoryKey Functions
Time Series (Stocks)GLOBAL_QUOTE, TIME_SERIES_INTRADAY, TIME_SERIES_DAILY, TIME_SERIES_WEEKLY, TIME_SERIES_MONTHLY
OptionsREALTIME_OPTIONS, HISTORICAL_OPTIONS
Alpha IntelligenceNEWS_SENTIMENT, EARNINGS_CALL_TRANSCRIPT, TOP_GAINERS_LOSERS, INSIDER_TRANSACTIONS, ANALYTICS_FIXED_WINDOW
FundamentalsOVERVIEW, ETF_PROFILE, INCOME_STATEMENT, BALANCE_SHEET, CASH_FLOW, EARNINGS, DIVIDENDS, SPLITS
Forex (FX)CURRENCY_EXCHANGE_RATE, FX_INTRADAY, FX_DAILY, FX_WEEKLY, FX_MONTHLY
CryptoCURRENCY_EXCHANGE_RATE, CRYPTO_INTRADAY, DIGITAL_CURRENCY_DAILY
CommoditiesGOLD (WTI spot), BRENT, NATURAL_GAS, COPPER, WHEAT, CORN, COFFEE, ALL_COMMODITIES
Economic IndicatorsREAL_GDP, TREASURY_YIELD, FEDERAL_FUNDS_RATE, CPI, INFLATION, UNEMPLOYMENT, NONFARM_PAYROLL
Technical IndicatorsSMA, EMA, MACD, RSI, BBANDS, STOCH, ADX, ATR, OBV, VWAP, and 40+ more

Common Parameters

ParameterValuesNotes
outputsize
compact
/ 
full
compact = last 100 points; full = 20+ years
datatype
json
/ 
csv
Default: json
interval
1min
, 
5min
, 
15min
, 
30min
, 
60min
, 
daily
, 
weekly
, 
monthly
Depends on endpoint
adjusted
true
/ 
false
Adjust for splits/dividends

Rate Limits

  • Free tier: 25 requests/day (as of 2026)
  • Premium plans: higher limits, real-time data, intraday access
  • HTTP 429 = rate limit exceeded
  • Add delays between requests when processing multiple symbols
import time
# Add delay to avoid rate limits
time.sleep(0.5)  # 0.5s between requests on free tier

Error Handling

data = av_get("GLOBAL_QUOTE", symbol="AAPL")

# Check for API errors
if "Error Message" in data:
    raise ValueError(f"API Error: {data['Error Message']}")
if "Note" in data:
    print(f"Rate limit warning: {data['Note']}")
if "Information" in data:
    print(f"API info: {data['Information']}")

Reference Files

Load these for detailed endpoint documentation: