Written by Bob Schneider    Posted November 2, 2006

On October 20, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox made the keynote address to the 39th Annual Securities Regulation Seminar. During the speech, Mr. Cox demonstrated several XBRL applications (including Hitachi’s Xinba Reader and Analyzer) in a live presentation — a display of courage that will impress anyone who has used any electronic equipment in front of large audiences.

But what we found particularly noteworthy about the speech was that Chairman Cox elected to discuss interactive data at all. In front of such an audience, with its collection of top-notch securities professionals, Mr. Cox could have spoken on any number of subjects much closer to their hearts and minds than a data standard many CFOs still haven’t heard of. Given the October 20th date, he might have even been forgiven for selecting a topic conducive to the partisan interests of a former Republican Congressman. (He did note the low U.S. unemployment rate of 4.6%, but he also made unkind mention of Jack Abramoff.)

And yet Mr. Cox chose to focus on interactive data. Here are a few of the key points he made:

• Both professional security analysts and small investors are frustrated by the enormous amount of financial information dumped on them that is difficult to manipulate and decipher.
• Interactive data provides a solution, because it will allow users of whatever background to request exactly the information they want from any number of company reports
• The SEC has committed over $50 million to give these capabilities to every investor “in the very near future.” (Mr. Cox made clear that meant months, not years.)

Chairman Cox’s commitment to interactive data is truly stunning. His business card could just as well read Chief Interactive Data Evangelist. Here’s a part of his speech that reflects the enthusiasm he brings to the job:

“What we’re envisioning at the SEC is a new way of delivering the numbers in financial statements here in America, and around the world that is so fast and so flexible, it will slash untold hours of waste, cost, and inefficiency from our economy, and make our capital markets vastly more efficient. Just as importantly, it will level the playing field for tens of millions of average investors.”

We encourage you to read the entire speech. All of us in the interactive data community owe Chairman Cox a huge debt for his leadership in promoting XBRL as a universal financial and business data standard.

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