Amassed Insights

Amassed Insights #2: Snowballed

Everything that's been snowballing in the alternative data industry recently

Jordan Hauer

Jordan Hauer

— 12 min read
A happy hour with alternative data nerds
A subset of those enjoying the Alternative Data Happy Hour #22 on December 4, 2024.

Well, That Snowballed Quickly

Now that winter really feels here, I'm going to take this chance to explore everything in alternative data that seems to be snowballing recently, whether positively or negatively:

A huge snowball running over people

Starting with the Plus Side

  • We officially had the first flurries of winter in NYC last week...maybe we'll be able to make snowballs sometime soon...or maybe we'll go yet another year without snow in NYC!
  • NYC was alive last week with Alternative Data events, both big and small, formal and informal. Data providers & data buyers were out-and-about more than ever before, snowballing into last Wednesday being the best-attended happy hour of the 22 I've hosted. And shout-out to my good friend, Mark Fleming-Williams, for hosting a really fun alternative alternative data happy hour the night before. It was great to see the community growing & thriving, as everyone I talked to was very bullish on what's to come in 2025!
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Now to the Down Side

"Delay, Deny, Depose"

  • The shocking news of the murder/assassination of Brian Thompson, the United Healthcare CEO, and the subsequent manhunt hit hard for me last week for a couple reasons:
  • Access to Change Healthcare's data across numerous large entities was revoked at that time, leading their clients (including many major institutional investors) scrambling for a replacement. I've heard most data buyers are still looking to fill that gap.

The latest updates from NYT on the UnitedHealthcare CEO Shooting

  • This disruption not only exposed people's personal health information, but lead to severe billing/payment & claim submission delays, snowballing into healthcare service disruptions, and according the New York Times, criticism of the "health care companies for putting profits above care", which appeared on a handwritten manifesto by new suspect Luigi Mangione, a Data Engineer at TrueCar for the past few years.
  • I never thought I'd feel compelled to write about a murder, let alone an assassination, especially in a humble alternative data blog. It's good to see that we at least have a suspect in custody now and am hoping we learn more about any motives and their evolution over the past few years of data breaches. Is this purely someone acting independently who feels slighted by the healthcare system (and its largest actor) or does it represent something more systemic to sociopolitical or economic landscape in this country? (more on sociopolitical upheaval below) An optimistic mind may think this can lead to some overdue intelligent technological reforms and required decentralization and security practices. Not sure how optimistic I am quite yet. ;)

The M Science & Yipit Fued

This trade secrets lawsuit has the alternative data industry buzzing
“These files were among Yipit’s ‘crown jewels,’” the 55-page lawsuit states.
Business InsiderBradley Saacks
  • Having been a party to an exceedingly-frivolous trade secrets case within the alternative data industry a while ago (maybe I'll post a full post-mortem on this in the future), I do have a strong perspective on this case between two true stalwarts in the alternative data space, M Science and Yipit, despite truly not having a horse in the race. I completely understand the instinct to value and closely protect your customer information & product planning documents and certainly don't believe former employees should have the right to take tangible materials owned by their former employer to their next job. This seems to be exactly what Yipit is asserting their former head of sales, Alex Pinsky, and Zachary Emmett, have done when moving onto a job at their former rival, M Science.
  • However, in the US, there is basically no recourse for someone alleging a frivolous lawsuit based on assumptions and fear, designed to slow down their competition. Now, while I have no direct knowledge whether that is the case here, if Yipit is being truthful and not just hyperbolic about these files being "among Yipit's 'crown jewels'", they're revealing an acute weakness in their business.
  • A healthy, growing business wouldn't or shouldn't worry too much about high-level sales employees leaving, as it doesn't change the ultimate product or its value proposition to their clients, and these types of legal proceedings are very expensive, monetarily and from the perspective of the number of hours they cost executives.
  • More importantly, a mature alternative data product should and would speak for itself, having had the time to build trust with ongoing customers and prove its worth on an ongoing basis. Every data and research product should have to be continually resold every subscription cycle, based on its success during the subscription/trial period. For hegde funds, this is usually done through a broker vote period. If done correctly, relationships are activated or deactivated following the broker vote period and the subscription period elapsing.
  • If you expect to use client relationships from a former employer for a free pass to subscribers for a new data product, you'll be very disappointed.

Sociopolitical Upheaval

There are so many high variance sociopolitical events happening around the world all at the same time right now, such as:

These events all underscore the importance of having access to unique, real-time, macroeconomic & sociopolitical indicators across geographies as any of these events could snowball in isolation, let alone in concert. I laid out this data request in my last newsletter, and am including a relevant data provider profile below.

Data Providers & Products

If any of the following data providers piques your interest for any reason, respond and I'll share additional materials & directly introduce you, if necessary.

BCMStrategy: Public Policy Quantified (Data Profile)

  • Summary: Built by a former senior government official long-time DC insider, BCMStrategy's unique, patented methodology quantitatively measures sovereign language, such as government filings and policies/regulations, and anticipates the policy shifts and their effects on companies and entire industries/economies. This refactored product is just now more broadly coming to market after years of research, testing, and refining based on feedback from asset managers.
  • Main Data Category: Public Policy
  • Unique Value Propositions:
    • Source materials are gathered directly from both ubiquitous and hard-to-find public sources.
    • Data enrichment processes can also be licensed & leveraged on proprietary textual data sources.
  • Historical Date Range: ~5 Years
  • Frequency: Daily
  • Coverage: 4,000+ tickers including the entire Russell 3000, currencies, & ETFs.
  • Key Data Fields: Momentum Index, Posture, MACD, RSI, Rate of Change
An Overview of BCMStrategy's Monetary Policy Data Product Offering
An Overview of BCMStrategy's Monetary Policy Data Product Offering
Get Introduced to BCMStrategy

New Data Providers

  • Blue-Sky Nexus (Data Profile)
    • Main Data Category: Financial Market Data
    • Brief: Provides financial data and services to developers, financial institutions, and individual investors, offering datasets on equities, corporate actions, forex, and economic data.
  • CLS Property Insight (Data Profile)
    • Main Data Category: Location - Stores & Real Estate
    • Brief: Provides property search, environmental risk, and title inspection data solutions for residential and commercial real estate transactions including flood risks, contaminated land reports, and planning permissions data.
  • eWorldTrade (Data Profile)
    • Main Data Category: Company Information
    • Brief: Provides B2B marketplace data connecting wholesalers, manufacturers, and buyers, offering market research analytics, trade metrics, and supplier verification data through their digital platform to inform sourcing and procurement decisions.
  • CNC Searches (Data Profile)
    • Main Data Category: Company Information
    • Brief: Provides company credit reports using D&B and Equifax data to analyze businesses' financial health, credit history, payment trends, and director backgrounds, offering insights for credit decisions and business partner evaluation.

New or Updated Data Products

M&A + Funding

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