Welcome to our site! I am a veteran in the financial data industry. I would like to share with you what this industry is about and help you build a career in this industry if you are interested in it.
Financial data industry is rapidly growing.
According to McKinsey* in 2025, financial data and markets infrastructure is one of the fastest-growing segments of financial services.
The industry provides data, technology and infrastructure which are vital to the success of numerous companies in the financial industry.
* McKinsey’s article in 2025: https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/financial-services/our-insights/financial-data-and-markets-infrastructure-positioning-for-the-future
What exactly are people selling in the financial data industry?
Imagine there is a hedge fund who trades thousands of stocks and needs to know how much it gains or loses at the end of the day. It will need a reliable data source for stock prices and a way to get the data for thousands of stocks systematically.
Imagine there is a bank who provides currency conversion service. The bank will need to know the real-time foreign exchange rates in order to achieve this bank service.
Companies in the financial data industry sell these data including stock prices and real-time exchange rates to these hedge funds and banks. The goods are not just the data. Sophisticated infrastructures and different means of delivering the data are also built to better serve the customers, making the data delivery timely, secure and efficient.
Data together with the services are the products in the financial data industry.
Who are these companies?
Famous companies in the industry include Bloomberg L.P., Refinitiv (LSEG), FactSet Research Systems Inc., Intercontinental Exchange, Inc., MSCI, Inc., S&P Global Inc..
These companies collect, cleanse, store and deliver different kinds of data. For example, Bloomberg L.P. has partnerships with over 300 exchanges. Data about the financial instruments traded on these exchanges are delivered to Bloomberg L.P.. The company processes the data, standardizes the data format and delivers the data to numerous clients via its global computer network.
These companies not only source data from outside, but also produce their own data. For example, Bloomberg L.P. creates and offers news data which can instantly influence the financial market.
What are the types of data products?
The world of data products is very diverse!
It can be broadly divided into two categories, static data and real-time data.
Static Data
Customers usually require them in lower frequency, here are some examples:
• end-of-day stock prices
• daily stock prices in last 5 years
• coupon and maturity date of bonds
• upcoming cash dividend of stocks
Besides the above traditional financial data, static data also includes ESG data (company’s ESG performance), corporate structure (parent-child company relationship), sanctions data, supply chain data. The list goes on and on!
Real-time Data
Customers usually require them in higher frequency, here are some examples:
• real-time bid and ask prices of stocks
• real-time volatilities of options
• real-time foreign exchange rates
• real-time news data
What are the technologies used to deliver the data?
Typically the data delivery can be achieved by:
• SFTP
• RESTful API
• SOAP API
• Cloud Delivery (e.g. data can be delivered to S3 bucket, an AWS cloud storage service)
• Website Download (data are usually published on web for manual download)
Real-time data delivery usually requires proprietary real-time API developed by the financial data companies. For example, Bloomberg L.P. uses BLPAPI.
The choice of data delivery methods depends on the demand for automation, nature of customer’s technology systems, etc.
Who are the customers?
Typical customers in financial industry include investment banks, commercial banks, hedge funds, asset managers, commodities trading firms. These customers consume a lot of financial data in their daily processes.
Finance and investment departments in multinational corporations also have high demand for financial data. Research departments in corporates can use data for industry analysis. For example, a chip manufacturing company can use the supply chain data and corporate structure data to investigate competitors’ company strategies.
What are the job opportunities?
The financial data industry needs a lot of talents!
Client-facing roles include sales, account manager, solution engineer, implementation specialist, support specialist.
There are also many roles in product development including data product manager, infrastructure engineer, software architect.
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Hopefully this gives you an overview of the financial data industry!
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