The message I delivered was that you can be a great programmer or data scientist, but when you are developing in the world of finance, at the end of the day, you always need data: data about stocks, the economy, bonds, and so on. This is because, unlike fields such as physics or biology, you cannot collect data from a controlled experiment in your own lab.
The social aspect of finance means that the experience is constantly unfolding all over the world, and there is an infinite amount of data you can use to conduct your analysis or build your application.
And that is why OpenBB exists.
With the OpenBB Terminal and Platform, students can pinpoint and monitor data closely linked with financial performance, improving their financial analysis and forecasting.
Leveraging OpenBB scripts to record industry insights and assumptions proves invaluable in analyzing past investment choices.
All of this allows students to understand successful strategies, shortcomings, and potential adjustments needed in future investment opportunities, for themselves or the careers they go on to have in the near future.
The audience was mostly composed of computer science students, so it was also interesting to dive into the idea of open source software and discuss both its history and principles.
It brings a lot of advantages for students, developers, and companies.
For students and developers, it's really about learning and accessing tools you can use and adapt to your projects.
From an enterprise perspective, it provides companies with a great amount of innovative technology that has been tested and polished at a very big scale.
For those new to Python, I explained that the OpenBB repo provides endless rabbit holes to explore code that can be dissected. Functions for calculating formulas, making charts, and collecting data are all starting points to build from - no need to start from scratch.
Overall, it was a unique experience and an incredible opportunity to share my perspective on this subject.
Finally, I would like to thank Professor Federico Castanedo for the invite and for pushing the University forward with initiatives and events like this.
I would also like to give a huge shout out to the team of IE University students on their qualification to the top 12 of the final round in WorldQuant's International Quant Championship!
Thinking about the future, I hope more and more finance students understand the numerous possibilities OpenBB, as a financial data platform, can bring.
If you look forward to leveraging your financial career with our products, check out our Academia page and start using OpenBB today for free.