Using Reuters 3000 Xtra system for financial information education

Reuters 3000 Xtra is a real‐time and interactive global news and financial information service that covers the equity market, bond market, foreign currency and money market, and various derivative markets. While there are hundreds of business schools in the USA, only a handful of schools have established real‐time financial and trading services for educational purposes. Currently only six schools are equipped with such services in the USA. The Subotnick Financial Services Center at the Zicklin School of Business of the City University of New York is the only real‐time trading facility for education in New York City. Given the many advantages of educating and training students using simulation of real‐time trading, the number of business schools that are considering acquiring such services is bound to increase. The emerging issue is how to use services such as Reuters 3000 Xtra to provide financial information education for students, faculty members, and potential traders. This article covers some important features of Reuters 3000 Xtra and illustrates how it may be used to provide financial information education. This article specifically discusses the use of Reuters Instruction Code (RIC), Speed Guide, Model Browser, and PowerPlus Pro to access, retrieve, organise, display, and analyse real‐time data. Furthermore, this article demonstrates taking advantage of the real‐time data feed to test the portfolio diversification theory by developing a diversified portfolio in the equity market. It is our hope that students, faculty members, business librarians, business information specialists and financial portfolio managers who are involved in Reuters 3000 Xtra training and teaching will benefit from this article.