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Overview
Wharton Research Data Services (WRDS) is a business research platform and intelligence tool widely used by academic, corporate, government, and nonprofit researchers.WRDS provides users a single online location for access to terabytes of data across multiple disciplines including: accounting, banking, economics, finance, ESG and statistics.
WRDS aggregates and retains content from a variety of data sources, and serves as a source of historical data from a number of vendors that themselves maintain only current information. Sources of data aggregated by WRDS include CRSP, S&P Global Market Intelligence, NYSE, and Thomson Reuters, as well as more specialized sources such as BoardEx, FactSet, Hedge Fund Research, Markit, Ravenpack and GSIOnline.
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Collection Content
WRDS aggregates and retains content from a variety of data sources, public and commercial, and serves as a source of historical data from many vendors that themselves maintain only current information, and from vendors that distribute data only on offline, portable media like CDs and DVDs. Sources of WRDS data include CRSP, S&P Global Market Intelligence, Dow Jones, NYSE, SEC's Edgar, and Thomson Reuters, and more specialized sources such as BoardEx, FactSet, Hedge Fund Research, Markit, Ravenpack and GSI Online. The resource was initially developed in 1993 to support faculty research at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the service has since evolved to a tool for a global research community.
Institutional subscribers can choose to make all or a limited number of datasets accessible to local users from the complete set of WRDS datasets. The data products, datasets, and analytics that are available through WRDS include:
- 2iQ
- American Hospital Association
- Audit Analytics and OIA (Other Independent Audits)
- Bank Regulatory
- BoardEx
- Bureau van Dijk
- Calcbench
- CBOE (Chicago Board Options Exchange)
- comScore
- Cortellis Life Sciences Healthcare Data
- The Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP)
- CSMAR
- CUSIP
- Direct Marketing Educational Foundation (DMEF)
- Dow Jones Average & Total Return Indexes
- ETF Global
- Eurekahedge
- Eventus
- FactSet
- Fama-French Portfolios & Factors
- Federal Reserve Bank Reports
- FTSE Russell Indexes
- GMI Ratings
- GOVPX
- GSIOnline
- Hedge Fund Research, Inc. (HFR)
- IHS Global Insight
- Infogroup
- Information Resources, Inc. (IRI)
- Institute for the Study of Security Markets (ISSM)
- ISS (formerly RiskMetrics)
- KLD Research & Analytics, Inc. (KLD)
- ktMINE
- Levin Associates Health Care M&A
- Markit
- Mergent Fixed Income Securities Database (FISD)
- MSRB
- Mutual Fund Links (MFLINKS)
- Nasdaq Trade and Quote (NASTRAQ)
- NYSE Trade and Quote (TAQ)
- OptionMetrics
- OTC Markets Group
- OTC Corporate Bond Transaction Data (TRACE)
- Pacific-Basin Capital Markets
- Penn World Tables
- Peters and Taylor Total Q
- Philadelphia Stock Exchange (PHLX)
- ProPublica
- RavenPack
- RepRisk
- Research Quotient
- S&P Global Market Intelligence
- SK&A Healthcare data
- SAS
- Sustainalytics
- Thomson Reuters
- Toyo Keizai
- U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
- WRDS SEC Analytics Suite
- Zacks
Through partnerships with vendors, WRDS also provides several analytic tools including: WRDS SEC Analytics Suite for customizing datasets of SEC filings; WRDS Quant Alpha Platform for discovery of stock anomalies; and the Wharton School's Online Trading & Investment Simulator (OTIS), a trading and investment simulation platform.
Delivery
Datasets can be accessed via a web interface, or can be downloaded directly from the WRDS UNIX server (wrds.wharton.upenn.edu) or via PC-SAS. Users must register with the service to gain access to the website.
Software available in the WRDS server includes SAS 8, Fortran 77 and Fortran 90, C, perl, and standard UNIX tools and text editors.
WRDS provides a common interface for access to all available databases; users can search by individual firm or across all firms simultaneously. The WRDS website provides several user services including an online support teams of research specialists, research applications such as template and sample programs, and E-learning tools.
Terms
WRDS services are for academic and non-commercial research only. Users must register with the service.
Strengths and Weaknesses
The database includes a number of datasets provided by third parties that are prone to come and go, depending on permissions. For example, inclusion of data in WRDS from Thomson Reuters’ First Call Historical Database (FCHD) was discontinued in February 2012.
The WRDS interface is considered by some to be less than optimally functional in the replicability of analysis, refining of data extraction, granularity of numbers output, and retention of observations.
A common problem experienced by subscribers is limitation of the use of WRDS databases to only certain user groups at an institution, such as faculty and graduate students, excluding undergraduate researchers.Terms of use often limit the number of workstations from which the product can be accessed at any given time, and require individual mediated sign on. Furthermore, libraries have experienced changes in terms of access to WRDS databases without prior notice.
The database is considered by many academic libraries to be prohibitively expensive. In 2016 subscription to the WRDS interface and content for a mid-sized university could exceed $60,000/year.
Endnotes
PATRICIA LEDESMA LIÉBANA, Retrieving Data from CRSP and Compustat. Northwestern University, udated 2008. http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/rc/docs/CRSP_Cstat_data_retrieval.p…
Database Tutorials: WRDS (Wharton Research Data Services). University of Southampton Libguides, (Last Updated: Dec 1, 2016) http://library.soton.ac.uk/tutorials/wrds
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