With the Excel function qp_date(a,b), b is the ticker, and a is a number representing days ago, who 0 is the most recent data day, - 1 is the day before of data, -2 is data two days ago, etc.
This function retrieves the date of that day. It was my assumption, that all stock tickers have the same dates for each number. This, apparently IS NOT SO!! This can really mess up you analysis. The following is the example where I discovered this. First, in Excel, check out =qp_data(-1745, b) where b refers to a cell with the ticker AVCA in it. You should get the result 2/1/2000..if you execute it on Sunday, 1/21/07. Next, in Excel, check out =qp_data(-1745, b) where b refers to a cell with the ticker T in it. You should get the result 2/8/2000...if you execute it on Sunday, 1/21/07. If you try this out on another day with more download data, you will get different dates, but the results will be the same. THE DATES ARE NOT EQUAL!!! why aren't they? Man, this messes up analysis I did in the past where I assumed all stock days have the same number associated with them. Can this be fixed? The above is just a random example. I realize that it is not the Excel function causing this.. it is the data.
