Technology Fee Application
2008-01
Request for Software
Department: Economics
Name of Primary Contact: Leanne Ussher
Email: leanne.ussher@qc.cuny.edu
Date:
11/11/08
Name of Software Bloomberg Terminal - Professional Financial Software
Source
Bloomberg
Brief description of the Software
See Attachment
What courses will take advantage of this database? How many students will be served?
See Attachment
Number of licenses 1
Cost $21,600 per annum or $1800 per month, per license.
Have you discussed this request with the Software License Manager at OCT?
This terminal was installed by OCT and has been in operation in the Economics
Department since 4/10/2007.
Technology Fee Application By the Economics Department
Request for market software used by financial professionals
This proposal is for financing an ongoing subscription to Bloomberg financial software. This
software is located on a laptop to create a Bloomberg terminal, located in the foyer of the
Economics Department PH 300. It offers professional financial data that is (near) real-time and
allows the download indicative and fundamental data of companies and financial paper,
historical pricing, customized analytics, print and multimedia news, electronic communications
on-demand 24 hours a day and an unlimited help facility for all users. All financial markets are
covered:
 Equities
 Money Markets
 Federal Government Securities
 Municipality Debt
 Foreign exchange
 Corporate/Euro/Sovereign Bonds
 Commodities and Energy
 Mortgage-Backed Securities
 Derivatives: credit default swaps, options, futures, etc.
Services include:
 Data and information on nearly all publicly traded securities
 20 minutes delay on real-time pricing from all major exchanges,
 Historical pricing (back to 1970s)
 News and research - over 3,000 stories a day, with hundreds of content providers
 Multimedia - recorded interviews
 Analytics - A wealth of charting and computational programs
 Portfolio System - customized portfolios can be priced and analyzed
 Digital training models allow students to learn on their own how to use this rich resource
 8 self taught “Bloomberg certification” following 8 modules
 Unlimited telephone and chat support 24 hours a day.
More details about this professional finance software is available at:
http://about.bloomberg.com/about/professional/index.html
The Bloomberg terminal is the industry standard and either inside QC courses or on a self taught
basis students can become Bloomberg Certified, which greatly aides them in the job market. For
example, this quote is from one of our recent graduates:
“I currently working for Alliance Bernstein (AB) in our investment management brokerage
operations sector. I started at AB immediately after graduation. I use Bloomberg approximately 2-3
times a week and I was not trained by AB on how to do so. I was expected to know how to use the
basic functions: using DES, ID, searching for historical prices, yields, etc... I did in fact learn the basic
functions from the terminal at Queens College. I believe that learning how to navigate through
Bloomberg should become a part of the business curriculum, all of my fellow co-workers are
familiar with Bloomberg from college.
With today's tight job market graduates can not afford to be one step behind their peers”
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Course Use
This proprietary market information can be included in numerous economics and business
classes. Since acquiring this terminal, four faculty and five classes have intensively used this
terminal from Fall 2007 to Fall 2008: BUS351 Financial Markets, BUS350 Investment Analysis,
BUS353 Futures and Options, BUS241 Corporate Finance, CSCI018 Business Computing. In
the year that this terminal has been in operation approximately 423 students have familiarized
themselves with the operation of the Bloomberg terminal by completing class assignments.
Approximately 20 have started the certification process and at least 8 have become certified
under their own initiative.1 The in-class projects they have been set have include:
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Basic Bloomberg features and the certification process
Calculation of Betas, total returns, price appreciation, dividend yields
Company information and Equity reports
Yield Curve Analysis
VAR analysis
Volatility estimations from historical data
Option Smiles
Each course generally offers two data assignments or case studies, and students are requested to
use the Bloomberg terminal, along with Excel, to download and then manipulate and analyze
data. This data may be recorded as a graph and accompanied by an explanation or essay, giving
an interpretation. Advanced students will use Bloomberg analytics to formulate an even more
detailed analysis.
The laptop that houses the Bloomberg software can be removed and used by faculty in their
offices to prepare for classes or during the lecture. Class modules and presentations can be saved
for later use in the classroom.
Although it takes time to build up a cadre of staff comfortable with using the Bloomberg
terminal, predictions are that it will be used more extensively in the future due to the hiring of
two full time distinguished lecturers from the financial sector this Fall 2008, who have
experience in using this software. Additional classes which would directly benefit most using
this software include:
BUS352 Investment Management
BUS384 Forecasting and Regression Analysis for Business
ECO249 Statistics as Applied to Economics and Business
ECO206 Macroeconomics
ECO382 Introduction to Econometrics
ECO386 Financial Econometrics
1
According to Bloomberg it is impossible for us to collect information on the number of accounts that have been
created on our terminal, its usage, or the number of people who have become certified. Hence these numbers are our
best guess based on student enrolment in each class and the faculty’s collective knowledge of student activities.
Other classes such as ECON 206 Macroeconomics and ECON 382 Econometrics have also used this software
though intermittently and are not included in these numbers.
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In particular, a new course starting in Spring 2009, BUS 386 Financial Econometrics, will make
extensive use of financial data. The Bloomberg terminal will be of particular interest to these
students who will be asked to collect financial data to study. The Bloomberg terminal give them
an option to access high frequency intra-day data which is otherwise unavailable. The
opportunity to utilize professional financial software (the Bloomberg Terminal) and use
professional tools to analyze this data, offers significantly more excitement and motivation for
study since it allows student projects to be similar in nature to real data analyses done in the
financial sector.
As well, a new Masters in Science in Enterprise Risk Management which has been proposed to
begin in Fall 2009. If instituted, this program will add approximately 100 new students each
year. All will be expected to acquire Bloomberg skills in order to avail themselves to data and
complete homework assignments.
In addition the computer science department offers a computational finance class, and has a new
proposal for a major in Dynamic financial Analysis (DFA) modeling. The Computer Science
Department has added a letter of support for this Tech Fee application (see attachment).
Given the extensive coverage of the Bloomberg data it is not surprising that a number of our staff
and adjuncts have used this terminal for their own research. This provides an incentive for
instructors to gain Bloomberg familiarization and eventually incorporate the terminal into
student lessons. The voluntary utilization of new tools by the staff takes time, but the expected
growth path for this software is very strong. Some comments by our staff who have used the
terminal include:
"I have used Bloomberg in each of my Computing for Business classes. Students are amazed at the
extent of information Bloomberg contains. Many begin taking certification exams, with full
intention of becoming certified.”
"Exposure to Bloomberg helps our students maintain a competitive edge among their peers at other
colleges. Familiarity with Bloomberg gives students pursuing a career in finance a head start."
"The presence of the Bloomberg terminal facilitates a vital element of undergraduate education:
connecting the real world --- of finance in this case, something about which most students are
aware and interested --- to classroom learning. Better than the relatively unorganized flow of
information on the web, Bloomberg provides quick access to a trove of historical data that can
place any economic development in immediate context, without the hassle of trawling for hours
online. It is the context that facilitates learning of otherwise esoteric ideas."
The expansion of the BBA program and the addition of new finance classes will provide
increasing demand for this importance resource which not only improves the level of class
content but contributes greatly to the job opportunities for our graduating students.
Given that many business programs around the country include the use of a Bloomberg
Terminal, and that students can directly certify themselves without using faculty resources, we
hope that we can be awarded funding to maintain access to this software. Our goal is to ask for
full or even partial funding, that would extend our access for a period long enough to help us find
alternative funds from donors.
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Cost
For over a year, funding for the Bloomberg terminal as come from the Office of the President
with approval from Sue Henderson. This is expected to end soon.
The cost of this software is:
Retail pricing license
Bloomberg software
Software for
1 laptop terminal
Per Month
Software for
1 laptop terminal
Per Year
$1,800
$21,600
Submitted by
Leanne Ussher
Assistant Professor
Economics Department
11/26/08
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