

One practical application for the Stocks data type would be for financial analysts to create an Excel workbook that updates a stock watchlist showing current prices and the changes expressed as a percentage in real time all in less than ten minutes. The near-ubiquity of Excel in business and its relative ease of use compared to other complex data modeling software opens up infinite possibilities for all kinds of organizations. This means that as long as your device has a connection to the internet, the data inside any cells marked with either the Stocks or Geography data type will be automatically updated in real time with the latest data delivered by Microsoft’s extensive global cloud infrastructure. If your organization has Office 365, then you’ll notice an option under the Data tab in Excel for “Stocks and Geography.” Unlike data types such as numbers that can be modified to operate as percentages, dates, or currency, the new “Stocks and Geography” data types are automatically linked to online sources. Uses for real-time data in Excel for Office 365 If you’re like me, then you are already thinking of all the ways that this new feature is going to change the way you look at your business data. Much like that feature, the October 2018 update of Excel in Office 365 enables you to pull real-time and constantly updated financial market and geographic data from the cloud into your spreadsheet. But one of the key benefits of having the cloud-powered version of Excel in Microsoft Office 365 is your ability to leverage the global data stored in the Microsoft Cloud in real time.Īmaxra blogged about this productivity-enhancing ability in the past with Map Charts in Excel. Microsoft has always used data types in Excel such as text, number, et cetera to help you build complex data models in spreadsheets.
