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Bloomberg Terminal

The Bloomberg Terminal is a computer software system provided by the financial data vendor Bloomberg L.P. that enables professionals in the financial service sector and other industries to access Bloomberg Professional Services through which users can monitor and analyze real-time financial market data and place trades on the electronic trading platform.[1] It was developed by employees working for businessman Michael Bloomberg. The system also provides news, price quotes, and messaging across its proprietary secure network. It is well known among the financial community for its black interface, which has become a recognizable trait of the service.[2] The first version of the terminal was released in December 1982.

Most large financial firms have subscriptions to Bloomberg Professional Services. Many exchanges charge their own additional fees for access to real time price feeds across the terminal. The same applies to various news organizations.


All Bloomberg Terminals are leased in two-year cycles (in the late 1990s and early 2000s, three-year contracts were an option), with leases originally based on how many displays were connected to each terminal (this predated the move to Windows-based application). Most Bloomberg setups have between two and six displays. As a data analytics and electronic trading platform, the Bloomberg terminal is available for an annual fee of around $24k per user or $27k per year for subscribers that use only one terminal.[3] As of 2022, there were 325,000 Bloomberg Terminal subscribers worldwide.[4]

History[edit]

In 1981, Michael Bloomberg was fired from Salomon Brothers. He was given no severance package, but owned $10 million worth of equity as a partner at the firm.[5] Using this money, Bloomberg, having designed in-house computerized financial systems for Salomon, set up a data services company named Innovative Market Systems (IMS) based on his belief that Wall Street would pay a premium for high-quality business information, delivered instantly on computer terminals in a variety of usable formats.[6] The company sold customized computer terminals that delivered real-time market data, financial calculations and other analytics to Wall Street firms. At first, the machine was called the Market Master terminal, but later became known as the Bloomberg Terminal[7] or simply "The Bloomberg." The terminal was released to market in December 1982.[7] Merrill Lynch became the company's first customer, purchasing a 30% stake in IMS for $30 million in exchange for a five-year restriction on marketing the terminals to Merrill Lynch's competitors.[8] In 1984, Merrill Lynch released IMS from the restriction.[8]


In 1990, the Bloomberg keyboard was released with a trackball and built-in voice-chat features. In 1991, the first color edition of the terminal was released.


Michael Bloomberg stepped away from working on the terminal in 2001 to run for New York City mayor, but returned to lead the project in 2014. Starting in 2012, Bloomberg Terminal had a greater annual revenue than Thomson Reuters, the company that founded the market data business.[9]


Currently, the hardware aspect of the terminal is only a series of accessories. Some of those accessories are a custom keyboard with special keys, a fingerprint scanner, and a dual-screen display.[10]

Pricing[edit]

Sales from the Bloomberg terminal account for more than 85 percent of Bloomberg L.P.'s annual revenue.[11] The financial data vendor's proprietary computer system starts at $30,000 per user per year.[12]

F2 GOVT – (U.S. treasury and non-U.S.)

government securities

F3 CORP –

corporate debt

F4 MTGE –

mortgage securities

F5 M-Mkt –

money market

F6 MUNI –

municipal debt

F7 PFD –

preferred shares

F8 EQUITY –

equity shares

F9 COMDTY –

commodity markets

F10 INDEX –

indices

F11 CURNCY –

currency markets

F12 CLIENT/ALPHA – portfolio functionality

Michael Bloomberg's 1997 autobiography contains a chapter entitled "Computers for Virgins", which explains the differences in the design of the terminal and its keyboard from the standard IBM PC keyboard layout that was popular at that time. The terminal's keyboard layout was designed for traders and market makers who had no prior computer experience. The look and feel of the Bloomberg keyboard are similar to an ordinary computer keyboard, with several enhancements which help users navigate through the system.


Keyboard keys are commonly referred to inside angle brackets with full commands being contained in curly brackets  e.g., {VOD LN Equity GO}. The function key names and then-standard beige colour of an ordinary keyboard were changed from the technical name, e.g., F10, to a memorable name and colour, e.g., Yellow. The F10 key is thus a Yellow key named Index. The Esc is coloured red and named Cancel in the Bloomberg system, with the red to catch one's eye to stop a task. The ↵ Enter key is referred to as GO with a green color, deriving from the Monopoly game board, by passing Go and collecting $200 in a hope that the user could make money on the information he would find.[13]


The Bloomberg keyboard includes a unique ≣ Menu key which navigates back to the previous function used. If no previous commands are found, ≣ Menu displays a list of related functions. Similarly, the History key will populate the command-line with previously used functions in reverse chronological order, as the key function does in certain command prompts.


The yellow hotkeys along the top of the keyboard are used to enter market sectors, and are generally used as suffixes to allow the terminal to correctly identify a security.


For example, if someone is interested in the Vodafone stock listed in the London market, one enters {VOD LN Equity GO} where VOD is the company's ticker symbol, LN is the venue code for London, and Equity is the market sector. A detailed option list related to Vodafone UK stock will pop up, the person can then choose different options by pressing related keys or using the mouse to select the option.


Similarly, {USDEUR Curncy GO} displays the U.S. dollar–Euro exchange spot rate.


Other common Bloomberg commands for Equity include:


Thus, if someone interested in the historical Vodafone UK stock price, they can directly type in {VOD LN Equity HP GO}.


The Bloomberg keyboard has traditionally been heavier and sturdier than standard keyboards (a previous version, the SEA100 Bloomberg keyboard weighed around 3 kg) with 3mm key travel and 19mm key pitch; it also comes with built-in speakers for multimedia features. The SEA100 version has a built-in, 500 PPI, 0.26 sq inch biometric sensor for user login verification. The current Starboard (Keyboard 4) version is 1.08 kg and uses flatter, chiclet-style keys which are quieter and have less key travel than Freeboard (Keyboard 3) and prior.

Bloomberg L.P.

Bloomberg News

Financial data vendor

Bloomberg Professional Services

Official website

Bloomberg Terminal keyboards from 1983 to present