Bloomberg-CFA hackathons showcase ASEAN quant talent

Sometimes a little competition can yield a whole lot of creativity. That’s certainly been the case for the “Top of Quant” hackathons sponsored by Bloomberg and the Chartered Financial Analyst association in Southeast Asia.

The first round of competitions showed how ASEAN financial service companies can use BQuant, Bloomberg’s powerful suite of open-source based technology tools, and Bloomberg terminal data to solve some of the industry’s most pressing problems.

For Rosalia V. De Leon, Treasurer of the Philippines, Bureau of Treasury, the competition demonstrated cutting edge work and revealed the future of investing. “All of the teams brought amazing solutions to the table,” she said. “[The apps] make investment decisions less stressful and streamline processes, resulting in time savings, fostering a better work-life balance, and proving you can do more with less.”

BQuant allows users to build, test and share research. So far, more than 20 hackathon teams in Thailand, Philippines, and Malaysia, have used the tools to bring their investment-focused apps to life. The entries have ranged from an app that analyzes cycles and returns to identify the best assets to invest in given the current environment to an app that provides synthetic credit ratings. The latter helps fund managers make bond investment decisions. Teams also creates an app called Quantamental Framework, which helps analyze and assist with systemic global tactical asset allocation. Judges, who represented the CFA and Bloomberg, selected winners in each region.

Mr. Win Phromphaet, CFA, President of CFA Society Thailand, said that the technology will transform the future of finance, and financial practitioners need to be well-prepared.

“CFA Society Thailand’s collaboration with Bloomberg in organizing this hackathon was an exciting opportunity for our members to have hands-on experience on Python coding,” he said. “We were very impressed to see how talented they were and their efforts had been an inspiration to all of us. We would like to thank the Bloomberg team and we look forward to future collaboration.”

BQuant is the evolution of the Bloomberg Terminal, empowering users to access, analyze, and apply data to create a new generation of quantitative investment tools. And as the talented teams at the ASEAN hackathons showed, the potential for innovation is unlimited.