Sample Search: Give the price of
corn on a daily basis for February, 1992.
Finding the Code:- Searching commodities in Datastream is not
as straight-forward as are other categories of data. The format of the
data you recover is very much dependent of the specific type of commodity
you are researching. For example, the value of metal is expressed by its
relation to a chosen index, by its cost per ton or by its cost per coin,
while other items are measured by cost per barrel or bushel. To find
Datastream codes for commodities you may enter HELP CO? in the "Program
Number" area in the main program window. The new program window will
prompt you to choose a category of commodities to search, from a given
list. Choose Grains and press enter. You will then find the correct code
number for corn in the resulting list of series. The code for Corn No. 2
yellow in Datastream is CORNUS2. The only datatype available is price.
This series, however, does not represent all types of corn. Rather, a
particular type of coffee was chosen as the measure for corn prices in
Datastream: Corn No.2 yellow, given in cents per bushel. Finding an exact
method of expression for a particular commodity is not always possible.
Commodities searches, then, will likely begin with your first determining
what commodity Datastream records will satisfy your search.
Finding the program:
Step 1 - To find the price of a
commodity over a short period of time, select Time Series as your type of
request. Next, choose commodities as your type of data and select the
first of the available programs under these headings: Up to 104 vaules
for any series in calendar format and press Enter. This program will
produce the single list of data required.
Step 2- In the new
program window, enter the series code CORNUS2 and press Tab to skip to the
next line. Enter the frequency, D, to obtain daily data, press Tab, and
enter the time period 1/2/92 to 28/2/92. After you press enter, the
desired data should appear on the screen in calendar format. If you
entered any parameters incorrectly, the program will stop, describe the
error, and allow you to enter each item again.
Things to
Remember:-
The International Monetary Fund's data on commodities is not
included in the Commodities category. It can be found under
Economics. Use program 150Z 97 12(IMF:COMMODITY PRICES) for help in
finding these codes.
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