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rerror-handlingxtslapplyquantmod

Have lapply continue even after encountering an error using getSymbols from quantmod

I am downloading some information from yahoo finance using quantmod wrapped in an lapply statement: 

require(quantmod)
tickers <- c("AAPL", "MSFT", "MKQ", "TSLA")
quotes <- lapply(tickers,function(x) getSymbols(x, src="yahoo", from="2015-02-01", auto.assign=FALSE))

The ticker MKQ is made up intentionally. I would like the loop to print the error but still create a list of xts objects with the requested data for the other 3 tickers.

I have tried to use tryCatch as follows but was unsuccessful: 

quotes <- tryCatch(lapply(tickers,function(x) getSymbols(x, 
src="yahoo", from="2015-02-01", auto.assign=FALSE)) , error=function(e) NULL)

Any suggestions on how to do this? I read the documentation on tryCatch but was not able to make sense of it.

Thank you.

Solution

  • You need to put the try block inside your function:

    quotes <- lapply(tickers, function(x) try(getSymbols(x, ...)))

    Note we use the simpler try here. If there is an error, your quotes object will contain an object of try-error class at location of element that caused the error.