Quandl

What Quandl does

Quandl (operating as Nasdaq Data Link) is a curated data marketplace platform that aggregates financial, economic, and alternative datasets from multiple publishers and distributes them to institutional investors on a subscription basis. Founded in 2013 in Toronto, Canada, the company was acquired by Nasdaq, Inc. in 2018 and now operates as a wholly-owned subsidiary with 11-50 employees. The platform's central differentiator is its curation discipline: fewer than 1 in 100 datasets analyzed become listed products, positioning the catalog as an institutional-grade alpha source spanning social media, satellite imagery, transaction records, and traditional market data.

The product suite includes Nasdaq Basic (real-time best bid/offer and trade data from the Nasdaq execution system and FINRA/TRF), Equities 360 (income statement, balance sheet, cash flow, pricing, and corporate actions), Nasdaq Fund Network Data Service (fund-level valuation for 130,000+ instruments), Earnings Quality Ranking (weekly scoring of US equities on accounting metrics), Marex Daily Speculative Positioning (daily commodity futures positioning), and a dedicated Alternative Data category. Distribution is API-first with Python, R, and Excel SDKs, complemented by a freemium onboarding flow (free sample data, premium monthly subscriptions). The platform added a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server in late 2025 to support AI-driven financial workflows, and serves customers globally across the USA, China, India, and Japan. Customer segments are tiered across institutional investors (hedge funds, asset managers, investment banks), fintech/media platforms, and individual users.

Name

Quandl

Legal name

Nasdaq, Inc.

Website

https://quandl.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2013

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Quandl, now Nasdaq Data Link, is a Nasdaq subsidiary operating a curated data marketplace that delivers financial, economic, and alternative datasets to institutional investors, fintech platforms, and individual users via API and monthly subscription access.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Financial Data and Alternative Data Marketplace

NAICS

Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (518), Web Search Portals, Libraries, Archives, and Other Information Services (519)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. (7370)

akta.pro primary industry

Data Distribution, Connectivity & Market Data Platforms (Entitlements, Normalization, APIs) (FSAFAIAJ)

akta.pro secondary industries

Data Sharing, Data Exchange & Data Marketplace Platforms (HDAEABAH), Reference Data & Static Data Operations (SSI/Instrument/Client Data) (FSACALAJ), Dataset Discovery, Marketplaces & Licensing (HDAAALAE)

Keywords

• Alternative data
• Financial datasets
• Data marketplace
• Investment analytics
• Economic data

Headquarters

HQ city

Toronto

HQ country

Canada

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Operations, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Data Subscription/ Licensing: Quandl operates as a data marketplace/platform providing access to alternative data and financial datasets to institutional clients including hedge funds, asset managers, and investment banks on a subscription or usage basis

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Nasdaq Data Link (formerly Quandl) operates a curated data marketplace that delivers financial, economic, and alternative datasets to institutional investors through a public API and web platform. Premium data products include Nasdaq Basic (best bid/offer and trade data), Equities 360 (fundamental financial data), Nasdaq Fund Network Data Service, Earnings Quality Ranking, Marex Daily Speculative Positioning, and a broad Alternative Data offering covering social media, satellite imagery, and transaction records.

Product overview

Nasdaq Data Link (formerly Quandl) operates as a unified data platform offering financial, economic, and alternative datasets. The platform architecture includes core data products such as Nasdaq Basic (best bid/offer and trade data), Equities 360 (fundamental financial data), Nasdaq Fund Network Data Service (fund valuation for 130,000+ instruments), Earnings Quality Ranking (weekly earnings quality scores for US equities), and Marex Daily Speculative Positioning (commodity futures positioning data). The Alternative Data offering provides access to unstructured data sources like social media, satellite imagery, and transaction records for investment alpha generation. All products are accessible via API with Python, R, and Excel integrations.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Nasdaq Data Link (formerly Quandl) A premier unified data platform providing financial, economic, and alternative datasets to analysts at hedge funds, asset managers, and investment banks, with uncompromising curation and API access.
• Nasdaq Basic Provides best bid and offer quotations from the Nasdaq execution system as well as trade data from the Nasdaq execution system and FINRA/Nasdaq Trade Reporting Facility (TRF).
• Equities 360 Provides fundamental data including income statement, balance sheet, cash flow statements, company reference data, pricing data, corporate actions, and analytics.
• Nasdaq Fund Network Data Service Provides historical and daily access to fund-level valuation, dividend, capital distribution reports and daily list for 130,000+ investment instruments from the Nasdaq Fund Network.
• Earnings Quality Ranking Provides a weekly ranking of relative earnings quality for a large universe of publicly traded US equities, ranking companies against industry peers on accounting metrics from 1 (low earnings quality) to 5 or 99 (high earnings quality).
• Marex Daily Speculative Positioning Estimates the aggregate net position of speculative trades in the commodities futures market on a daily basis, providing a faster and timelier signal than the Commitments of Traders (CoT) report.
• Alternative Data Alternative data offering positioned as the deepest, least utilized alpha source, providing actionable, profit-generating insights including social media, satellite imagery, and transaction records to power investment strategies for hedge funds, asset managers, and corporates.
• Nasdaq Data Link API Public API enabling developers to access financial, economic, and alternative datasets programmatically, with Python, R, and Excel SDKs for building market-beating strategies.

Named customers3 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

Yes

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration3 records

Feature2 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Data PublisherscoreOthersQuandl aggregates datasets from multiple publishers including alternative data providers, financial data vendors, and market data sources. The platform curates and distributes these datasets to institutional clients.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Eagle Alpha: Eagle Alpha is an alternative data marketplace and advisory focused on connecting institutional investors with alternative data providers. It is explicitly named alongside Quandl as a key player in the alternative data market and competes head-to-head as a curated data marketplace.
• Predata: Predata provides alternative data signals derived from online and social media activity for institutional investors and is named alongside Quandl as a key alternative data vendor. Direct overlap on the social/sentiment alternative data category.
• Marex (data products): Marex supplies the Daily Speculative Positioning product distributed via Nasdaq Data Link and also distributes other proprietary financial data products to institutional clients. Comparable as an alternative and commodity data publisher on the Quandl marketplace.
• Thinknum Alternative Data: Thinknum Alternative Data provides web-scraped and alternative datasets (job postings, company reviews, pricing) to hedge funds and asset managers, named alongside Quandl as a key alternative data competitor. Comparable curation-led marketplace model.

Others

• Dataiku: Dataiku is an enterprise AI and data science platform used by financial institutions to consume and analyze datasets, including alternative data feeds. It is an enabling/adjacent technology in the same institutional data workflow rather than a direct data marketplace competitor.

Broad incumbents

• FactSet: FactSet supplies portfolio analytics, fundamentals, and alternative data feeds to the same hedge fund and asset manager audience as Nasdaq Data Link. It is a direct overlap on core US equity fundamentals (Earnings Quality Ranking, fund data) and on alternative dataset distribution.
• Refinitiv (LSEG): Refinitiv, now part of London Stock Exchange Group, provides financial market data, reference data, and an expanding alternative data offering to asset managers, banks, and corporates. Directly comparable on core financial data distribution and increasingly on alternative data.
• Bloomberg: Bloomberg Terminal and Bloomberg Data Services deliver core and alternative financial data to the same institutional buy-side and sell-side client base as Nasdaq Data Link, often bundling feeds into a single enterprise platform. It is the dominant incumbent in market data distribution.
• S&P Global Market Intelligence: S&P Global Market Intelligence provides fundamentals, reference data, and alternative datasets to the same institutional investor cohort as Nasdaq Data Link, bundled into enterprise data products. Comparable on core reference and fundamental data.

Emerging players

• AlphaSense: AlphaSense is a market intelligence and alternative data platform serving buy-side and corporate strategy teams with AI-driven search across filings, transcripts, and proprietary research. Overlaps with Quandl's institutional client base and is increasingly competitive in the AI-driven research workflow.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/quandl
• Facebookfacebook.com/quandl
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/quandl

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles9 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds4 records

Investors4 records

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Quandl