Google Finance Blog - News and Views from the Google Finance team

Happy Birthday Google Finance!

Monday, March 21, 2011 at 1:27 PM

Posted by Karolina Netolicka, Product Manager and Laura Hughes, Consumer Operations

Google Finance celebrates its fifth birthday today. We thought this would be a great opportunity to look back on the last five years and highlight some of the most exciting features we have launched.

Google Finance launched on March 21, 2006 with pricing data from the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, Amex and Euronext. Our most innovative feature at the time was the now-familiar interactive chart that seamlessly scrolled, zoomed, and showed a timeline of news coverage for each company. Later that year we added the ability to track your investments in a portfolio.

New Features

In 2007 we added some major new ways to access Google Finance. We launched our first mobile application and iGoogle gadget. In addition, we added the GoogleFinance functions which allow you to easily incorporate financial information into your Google Spreadsheets.

In 2008 the big addition was the Stock Screener. In 2009 we added Google Domestic Trends, which uses search data to track the state of the US economy. Finally, last year we added options data and the ability to chart the performance of your portfolio.

Apart from these big launches, we’ve also made countless smaller improvements. Both charts and quotes now automatically update while you’re viewing the page. You can display technical indicators on the chart, view after-hours trading data, and expand the chart across the whole page. You can see information on related companies for all US public companies. And your portfolio now adjusts your holdings for splits and dividends.

Data Coverage

Over the years we have expanded our data coverage to 24 exchanges in 15 countries. More importantly, though, Google Finance has pushed for consumer access to free real-time quotes. In 2008 we were the site to launch real-time quotes for NYSE and NASDAQ
to non-logged-in users. Since then, we have upgraded all of our data in China and India to real-time.

Today, Google Finance continues to deliver timely financial data to users all over the world. Our users rely on us for our stability - Google Finance was one of the few services to stay up during the flash crash on May 6, 2010. As much as you rely on us, we also rely on you. Last year we launched a Product Ideas page, receiving over 5,000 feature ideas. This type of user engagement is what has allowed us to offer you the product we present today. Thank you all for a great five years, and here’s to many more ahead!

Then (2006):



Now (2011):