OptiRisk, Thomson Reuters and RavenPack contribute expert commentary on news analysis and its application to financial markets

LONDON & NEW YORK  – OptiRisk, the optimisation and financial analytics provider, today announced the publication of „The Handbook of News Analytics in Finance‟, the first compilation of the research from leading industry experts on the impact of news in moving the financial markets. Bringing together recent work from principal researchers, practitioners and suppliers in the field of news analytics the handbook seeks to define the four corners of this increasingly influential discipline.

The use of news analytics tools is now becoming mainstream in financial markets with institutions using such tools to feed high-frequency, sub-second trading engines as well as to aggregate weekly and monthly news data to analyse trends, improve their risk models and hedge against market movements. More recently, trading firms have also looked to interpret the sentiment found in new forms of communication such as Twitter and blogs to generate alpha.

The handbook is designed to deliver a rapid and comprehensive understanding of the main elements of news analytics by featuring research from esteemed professors Andrew Lo, Terrence Odean and Sanjiv Das as well as insight from market practitioners Thomson Reuters and RavenPack who offer products in this space. The handbook is edited by Professor Gautam Mitra who has set out a road-map that professionals and academics can follow to augment or kick-start their skills in the field of news analytics.

“We set out to make this publication a timely and ground-breaking source of knowledge on how qualitative sources of information can be used in the quantitative investment process,” said Professor Mitra.

The content is presented in four parts: the first deals with the measurement of sentiment, the second with the relationship between news and abnormal returns, the third with enhancing risk control using news, and the concluding section featuring an industry focus from experts in the vendor community, and a concise summary of the main providers of content and technology in this space.

Following his review of the book, Matthew Lee, Head of Research at BlackRock, said: “The world runs on information and few areas as directly so as in Finance. Now that technology and quantitative techniques have caught up to the live news feed, this volume will be an indispensible addition to the practitioner’s library.”

Professor David J. Hand, President of the Royal Statistical Society, added: “This book is the first to provide a comprehensive overview of the state of the art. The work described in this volume will enable us to discern and quantify the forces which steer financial markets.”

The handbook is published by John Wiley and Sons, Ltd and is available now for purchase.