Hedge funds are using these 10 alt-data sources to gain an investing edge as coronavirus upends supply chains and wreaks havoc on global markets

Shayanne Gal/Business Insider

These 10 alt data sets offer some insight into COVID-19's impact on the markets.

• With companies revising their forecasts and governments scrambling to put out up-to-date statistics, more investors are turning to alternative data to gauge the impact of the global spread of coronavirus.
• Some of the top datasets identified by BattleFin's Tim Harrington include supply-chain tracking information, social media sentiment analysis, and web-traffic data.
• "Traditional information and data isn't timely enough," said Emmett Kilduff, founder of Eagle Alpha.
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As investors look for a lifeline in what has been a rocky few weeks in the market, many are hoping their saving grace could come in the form of non-traditional datasets.

The novel coronavirus, COVID-19, has thrown global markets into disarray. And with traditional data - like corporate reports and government statistics - being revised or on a time delay, investors are plunging into alternative data streams that can provide them more up-to-date info.

On BattleFin's Ensemble platform, there were 35 data sets related to COVID-19 as of Thursday morning. On Ireland-based Eagle Alpha, there were 49.

"Traditional information and data isn't timely enough," said Emmett Kilduff, founder of Eagle Alpha.

On Eagle Alpha's platform of more than 1,200 alt-data vendors, 59% update daily, Kilduff said. On a call Eagle Alpha held Friday on morning to discuss helpful datasets, Kilduff mentioned that representatives from several central banks had dialed in to see how they could understand the situation on the ground more quickly.

On a webinar on Thursday, BattleFin founder and president Tim Harrington and Ishpreet Pandher, Battlefin's chief strategy officer, highlighted data sets they viewed as being the most useful in determining coronavirus' impact.

"There's obviously a ton of fear and uncertainty out there. One of the things we think this highlights is the need for alternative data," Harrington said. "How can we think about what are the data sets that are going to actually be giving us signals that we're starting to get back into an upswing."

But Kilduff said that the best work data providers are doing is bespoke projects for hedge funds. He said Eagle Alpha is helping with a project to track foot traffic, through cell-phone geolocation data, at Grand Central to see when people return from mandatory work-from-home policies. Other data providers are tracking the companies that are profiting the most off conspiracy theories that now rapidly circulate online everyday.

Here are the 10 alternative data providers highlighted by BattleFin: