Phase 1 – Lesson 5: Collections (Lists, Tuples,
Dicts, Sets)
Collections let you store multiple values. In finance, you'll use them for price series, trade records,
positions by ticker, and unique symbol sets. This lesson stays loop-free; we'll revisit automation with
loops in Phase 2.
1) Lists – ordered & mutable
Use for: sequences of changing values (e.g., recent prices).
prices = [100.5, 101.2, 102.8, 99.7]
prices[0] → 100.5
prices[-1] → 99.7
[Link](105.3) # add
prices[1] = 101.9 # modify
2) Tuples – ordered & immutable (in depth)
Use for: records you don't want to change (e.g., a trade fill).
trade = ("TSLA", 50, 720.50) # (ticker, shares, buy_price)
trade[0] → "TSLA"
# trade[0] = "AAPL" ■ (can't modify a tuple)
Unpacking:
ticker, shares, buy_price = trade # creates variables on the spot
# ticker == "TSLA", shares == 50, buy_price == 720.50
Why tuples? Safety: accidental edits to historical records are prevented. Many functions also
return tuples so you can unpack multiple values at once.
3) Dictionaries – key → value mapping
Use for: mapping tickers to positions, prices, metadata.
portfolio = {"AAPL": 50, "TSLA": 20, "MSFT": 10}
prices = {"AAPL": 150.5, "TSLA": 720.2, "MSFT": 310.1}
portfolio["AAPL"] → 50
portfolio["TSLA"] += 5 # increase shares
4) Sets – unique, unordered
Use for: unique tickers across sources, fast membership checks.
tickers = {"AAPL", "TSLA", "MSFT", "TSLA"}
# {'AAPL', 'TSLA', 'MSFT'} (duplicates removed)
"AAPL" in tickers → True
5) Mini-Project (no loops yet): Portfolio Report
Given:
portfolio = {"AAPL": 10, "TSLA": 5, "MSFT": 12}
prices = {"AAPL": 150.5, "TSLA": 720.2, "MSFT": 310.1}
Compute values manually (we'll automate with loops in Phase 2):
aapl_value = portfolio["AAPL"] * prices["AAPL"]
tsla_value = portfolio["TSLA"] * prices["TSLA"]
msft_value = portfolio["MSFT"] * prices["MSFT"]
total_value = aapl_value + tsla_value + msft_value
print(f"AAPL: {portfolio['AAPL']} shares, Value ${aapl_value:,.2f}")
print(f"TSLA: {portfolio['TSLA']} shares, Value ${tsla_value:,.2f}")
print(f"MSFT: {portfolio['MSFT']} shares, Value ${msft_value:,.2f}")
print("------------------------")
print(f"Total Portfolio Value: ${total_value:,.2f}")
Bonus (peek ahead): Tuple-of-tuples portfolio
portfolio_trades = (
("AAPL", 10, 150.0),
("TSLA", 5, 700.0),
("MSFT", 12, 300.0)
)
# We won't loop yet; just note how each trade record is immutable and safely structured.
