Commodity Systems Inc.

Commodity Systems Inc.

Commodity Systems Inc. (CSI) of Boca Raton, Fla., has a long-standing reputation as the predominant data vendor for commodity traders.

Offering daily summary prices on major markets around the world, CSI's breadth and scope of coverage are unmatched in the

The president of CSI, Bob Pelletier, started the business with data he had compiled as a trading advisor. Beginning in the mid-1970s, he and a few co-workers provided data and analytical software to major banks, data banking firms and brokerage companies around the world. By the late 1970s, the microcomputer revolution had brought technical analysis to the individual investor. CSI has since flourished servicing both large and small accounts.

John Sweeney, technical editor of Technical Analysis of Stocks and Commodities, recently reviewed CSI's software but took the opportunity to make this comment about CSI's data services: "Should you need really good data, CSI is the only choice."

One unique aspect of the CSI data base is the availability of processed data such as perpetual contract data and seasonal indexes. This type of information is important to intermarket applications such as neural networking.

CSI offers a variety of software programs, all designed with investors in mind. The heart of the software stable is the Quick System package, which consists of four integrated modules.

QuickTrieve/QuickManager automatically dials into the data base for daily data retrieval. It can update CompuTrac, MetaStock and Dow Jones files while distributing data to CSI files. Conversion to ASCII files is also supported.

QuickPlot/QuickStudy offers graphics and technical analysis. Sweeney wrote of QuickStudy, "Once you know the keystrokes, you can flip back and forth between charts, merge and separate charts and compare them easily. I thought it a vast improvement over the former version and on par with specialty software costing hundreds of dollars more. As far as analytics, it's a best buy in a quick-and-not-too dirty package."

In addition to standard toolkit studies such as moving averages, momentum, RSI, stochastics and others, QuickStudy includes some original studies developed by Pelletier. Pelletier was called an innovator by Bruce Babcock of Commodity Traders' Consumer Report, who reviewed these studies.