Bloomberg Takes Home Best Alternative Data Provider at WatersTechnology’s Inside Market Data & Inside Reference Data Awards 2025

Bloomberg is honored to announce it has been named Best Alternative Data Provider at the 2025 WatersTechnology Inside Market Data & Inside Reference Data Awards. This marks Bloomberg’s first win in the category and builds on last year’s Best Alternative Data Initiative win.

“Our goal has always been to make alternative data accessible, scalable, and easy to adopt across a broad range of research workflows,” said Richard Lai, Global Head of Alternative Data at Bloomberg. “This award affirms Bloomberg’s leadership in delivering high-impact Alternative Data solutions that integrate seamlessly with traditional market data, broker research, estimates, and news — giving clients a sharper, more informed view of company performance.”

Bloomberg’s Alternative Data solutions available directly within investors’ research workflows on the Bloomberg Terminal include:

• Bloomberg’s Alternative Data Analytics Platform: Available via {ALTD<GO>}, this platform provides a differentiated look into the performance of public and private companies in near real-time. Datasets currently available on the platform include Bloomberg’s proprietary Bloomberg Second Measure (BSM) consumer transaction data analytics, foot traffic data analytics from Placer.ai, and web traffic data analytics from Similarweb, with more to be added.
• BSM U.S. Consumer Spend Index: The BSM U.S. Consumer Spend Index utilizes BSM transaction data analytics feeds to provide a near real-time, comprehensive view of U.S. consumer spending, enabling analysis by sector and subsector, as well as breakdowns by channel (online vs. in-store). The Index is available via the World Economic Analyzer {ECAN<GO>} solution, and offers investors a differentiated way to track consumer spending in the U.S., using both alternative data and traditional macroeconomic indicators.

Bloomberg also offers complementary data feed products as part of its suite of Alternative Data solutions, allowing the company to meet varying client needs and ensure data consistency across the enterprise:

• BSM Aggregated Transaction Data Analytics Feeds: Bloomberg’s proprietary BSM transaction data analytics are available for use across the enterprise via Bloomberg Data License. This enables seamless integration of the high-quality alternative dataset with Bloomberg’s traditional Data License content, providing greater depth of analysis and earlier insight into consumer company performance — with a 3-day lag. Powered by these data analytics, the BSM U.S. Consumer Spend Index is also available as a data feed.
• BSM Transaction-Level Data Analytics: Bloomberg’s Transaction-Level Data Analytics is a granular transaction data feed product covering brand and company metadata for over 4,000 brands. It allows clients to build custom panels and normalizations, perform cohort analysis, and track macroeconomic KPIs, providing significantly deeper insight into company performance and consumer behavior. The feed is delivered at industry-leading speed, on a 2-day lag.

Bloomberg has also made the data feed products in its Alternative Data solution suite available via Bloomberg Query Language (BQL). This allows clients to utilize the data throughout their workflows analyzing company performance in Microsoft® Excel, BQuant Desktop, and BQuant Enterprise, enabling powerful screening and research analytics at greater scale.

The annual Inside Market Data & Inside Reference Data Awards recognize initiatives, innovation, technology and services across the market and reference data domains, including ESG and alternative data, corporate actions data, data analytics, evaluated pricing data, research, data management tools, and managed data services.

Read WatersTechnology’s full write-up on why Bloomberg won Best Alternative Data Provider.

The Bloomberg Second Measure U.S. Consumer Spend Index is not administered by Bloomberg’s benchmark administration business and is not intended for use as a financial benchmark

About Bloomberg

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Hannah Logan, hlogan5@bloomberg.net, +1-212-617-9742