1 Introduction

If you currently work in the finance industry, or have aspirations of doing so, chances are you have heard of a Bloomberg terminal. This Beginner’s Guide to Bloomberg tutorial will introduce you to one of the industry’s most widely used sources for real-time financial information. This guide is aimed at new Bloomberg users, and will provide an overview of how to use a Bloomberg terminal. If you are a more experienced user, or if after reading this guide you want to go into more detail on Bloomberg’s capabilities, please be on the lookout for the Advanced Guide to Bloomberg.https://3b5be67770c8865d35f2e3d2bbdf3931.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

In this basic guide, we will examine how to sign up for, install, and access Bloomberg. We will then go on to covering basic navigation on the Bloomberg system. Navigating Bloomberg is somewhat unique in that the system uses a special keyboard with some keys that are different from those found on a “normal” keyboard. Therefore, the navigation section of this guide will be important to newcomers. After gaining a working knowledge of these basics, we will then move on to discuss some of the market and news monitor functions that are available on Bloomberg. The remainder of the tutorial will include information on analyzing securities as well as some tips and tricks for getting the maximum possible benefit from this remarkable machine.https://3b5be67770c8865d35f2e3d2bbdf3931.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

2 Installation and Access

There are two ways to begin using Bloomberg. The first is to subscribe to the Bloomberg service. You can do so by contacting them (general contact number is (212) 318-2000).¹ The representative you speak with can then take down details of what you are looking for and have someone from the sales team contact you. Pricing and terms of the contract are unique to each user and would be discussed when the sales team contacts you. However, be aware that Bloomberg is an expensive system and that having your own terminal may not be practical for all users. Should you decide to subscribe to your own service, Bloomberg can help you install the software over the phone, or can come out to visit you and assist in installation. Note: the software can be installed on most PCs, but the company will give you a special keyboard for navigating the system. The second method of accessing Bloomberg is to find a public facility that has a Bloomberg terminal. Many larger libraries and universities have one, so that is a good place to start looking. https://3b5be67770c8865d35f2e3d2bbdf3931.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.htmlThe downside of this approach is that you won’t be able to customize the system and will have to share it with other users. However, for many users these drawbacks may be outweighed by the cost savings over subscribing to the system as an individual.

Once you have accessed the system, the next trick is to figure out how to navigate. A good starting place would be either to schedule a visit from a Bloomberg customer service representative or to call customer service for some help. Bloomberg is usually quite good at providing technical support and assistance, and a representative should be able to give you a good start on using the terminal.

Bloomberg functions

To be more productive, faster, and more efficient when performing financial analysis or research it’s important to be proficient at using the Bloomberg Terminal. That means knowing the most important Bloomberg functions.

Whether you work in investment banking, equity research, or other areas of the capital markets, you’ll have to learn how to use the Bloomberg Terminal for grabbing historical financial information about a company, share prices, transactions, bonds/fixed income information, and much more.

Here we have compiled a list of what we believe are the most common and important functions, keystrokes, and shortcuts to know on the Bloomberg Terminal, inside out.  Bloomberg functions mastery is key to becoming a great financial analyst.

• Green represents ‘Action’ keys. The most useful are Help/F1 for help and End/Back to go back a screen.
• Yellow are ‘Market Sector’ keys. The most useful one for beginners is Equity/F8.
• Blue is the ‘Panel’ key, in the bottom centre, which allows you to switch between the four windows available within Bloomberg. The fraction symbols keys are also blue, at the top, such as ½.
• Red keys are used to log out of the system. You can only be logged into one Bloomberg terminal at a time.

Further information on the keyboard

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2. Search for information about a company

Bloomberg primarily covers data on publicly quoted companies, such as Tesco PLC. It does also have some limited coverage of larger private companies. Complete the following activities to become familiar with Bloomberg.

Activity 1: Find company overview information

1. In any Bloomberg panel (window), in the search bar at the top, type the name of the company you wish to search for but do not press Enter yet. For example, ‘Tesco’.
2. Some suggestions will appear below where you typed, grouped by categories such as functions, securities and search. Click on the most relevant one, checking that it is a security (equity or company) and trades on the right stock exchange (e.g. London). Its name will appear in full (e.g. ‘Tesco PLC (London)’). You will see the short code for the company you selected (e.g. ‘TSCO LN Equity’).
3. You can choose from a menu of the most common functions. Click on the second item ‘Security Description’, which shows a short code DES.
4. The Description function will load for the selected equity (Tesco or other). It contains an overview including a business description, mini price chart, market cap and executive directors.

Activity 2: Find company accounts and financial analysis

1. The Financial Analysis function contains a company’s balance sheet, profit & loss account and income statement (cash flow) items. Whenever you launch a new function, the previously selected company will be applied to it; you do not need to enter the company name or code again. Load the Financial Analysis function by one of the following methods:
   a. Press the green ‘End/Back’ key to return to the menu of common functions, and click on item ‘7 Financial Analysis’ which has a short code FA.
   b. If this does not work, try typing ‘financial analysis’ in the search bar and select it.
2. Click on the second tab ‘I/S’ (Income Statement). The rows contain items such as revenue and operating expenses. The columns contain years or quarters. Here, you can select between ‘Adjusted’ (standardised) or ‘As Reported’ details by clicking on those labels.
3. Any amber coloured field in Bloomberg can be changed to a different value. In this function, you can change the number of periods and frequency being reported. Try changing from the default 10 years to four quarters. Does it work? Does Bloomberg have that historical data for your company at that frequency?
4. Many functions allow you to export or copy data to Microsoft Excel. The exact method varies from function to function. In Financial Analysis, change back to 10 years data, click on the red menu bar ‘Output > Excel > Current Template’, and wait for the data to load in Excel.
5. The Line Chart function shows a graph of the company’s share price going back days, months or years. Press End/Back and click on ’18 Line Chart’ which has short code GP, or type ‘line chart’ in the search bar.
6. You can change the start and end dates in the amber fields, or choose a pre-set option (e.g. 5Y for last five years). In the ‘Daily ▼’ drop down, you can choose the frequency from intraday, daily, weekly, monthly or yearly. The smaller frequencies like daily only provide access to more recent data; if you want more than five years ago, you will need to choose monthly, not daily. Try Daily 5Y, Monthly 10Y and Yearly 40Y.

Activity 2 Advanced: Line chart functionality

7. The Line Chart function has many other features. We shall try one: add a second line over the top to show the history of the index associated with your stock. Click on the ‘<<’ icon to the top-right of the chart to make the ‘Chart Content’ panel appear on the right. In the amber ‘Add a security…’ field, type the name of the index (e.g. FTSE 100) and click on the right suggestion below. The second line will appear. You can see how closely (or not) the selected company price changed in relation to that index.

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Bloomberg News, news service based in New York City, New York, known for providing business and economic news to investors and for increasing competition between business newswires. Bloomberg News is operated by Bloomberg LP, a private financial-data services and media company.

Bloomberg L.P. is a privately held financial, software, data, and media company headquartered in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It was founded by Michael Bloomberg in 1981, with the help of Thomas Secunda, Duncan MacMillan, Charles Zegar, and a 12% ownership investment by Merrill Lynch.

Bloomberg L.P. provides financial software tools and enterprise applications such as analytics and equity trading platform, data services, and news to financial companies and organizations through the Bloomberg Terminal (via its Bloomberg Professional Service), its core revenue-generating product. Bloomberg L.P. also includes a wire service (Bloomberg News), a global television network (Bloomberg Television), websites, radio stations (Bloomberg Radio), subscription-only newsletters, and two magazines: Bloomberg Businessweek and Bloomberg Markets.

The company has 167 locations and nearly 20,000 employees.

The company’s director of global construction Anthony Gozzone took part in bribery between 2010 and 2017 in which he accepted bribes in exchanging for awarding construction work done for Bloomberg. Guzzone has accepted more than $5.1 million in bribes and he pleaded guilty to tax evasion on the bribes in September, 2020 and sentenced to prison for three years and two months in January 2021

History

In 1981 American businessman and politician Michael Bloomberg founded the company that became Bloomberg LP (originally named Innovative Market Systems). Initially, the company sold computer terminals to Wall Street investment banks that included financial data about stocks, bonds, and other investments. In 1990 Bloomberg and American journalist Matthew Winkler launched Bloomberg Business News, with Winkler serving as editor in chief. The news service was provided on the company’s computer terminals.

By 1991, Bloomberg Business News had opened bureaus in New York, Washington, London, Tokyo, Toronto, and New Jersey. In 1994 it added Bloomberg Television, a business news channel. That same year, the company started an investing magazine called Bloomberg Personal that was distributed as a Sunday newspaper supplement, and in 1996 it opened Bloomberg Press, which published books for financial professionals and the general public on investing, economics, and current affairs. In 2009 the company acquired BusinessWeek magazine (renamed Bloomberg BusinessWeek).

About us

Bloomberg is the world’s primary distributor of financial data and a top news provider of the 21st century. A global information and technology company, we use our dynamic network of data, ideas and analysis to solve difficult problems every day. Our customers around the world rely on us to deliver accurate, real-time business and market information that helps them make important financial decisions. At Bloomberg, we are guided by four core values that are the foundation of our continued success: innovation, collaboration, customer service and doing the right thing. We harness the power of data and technology to organize, understand and improve our world. It’s our purpose. Come find yours. Websitehttp://bloomberg.com/companyIndustriesFinancial ServicesCompany size10,001+ employeesHeadquartersNew York, NYTypePrivately HeldFounded1981SpecialtiesFinancial Data, Analysis, Software Engineering, Machine Learning, News, and Media

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