Wikipedia pageviews as investors’ attention indicator for Nasdaq

The attempt to measure investors’ mood to find an early indicator of financial markets has evolved and developed with the advancement of technology over the years. The first attempts were based on surveys, a long and expensive process. Nowadays, big data has made it possible to measure the investor’s mood accurately and almost entirely online. This paper analyzes the explanatory and predictive capacity of Wikipedia pageviews for the Nasdaq index. For this purpose, two econometric models have been developed. In both models, the explanatory variable is the number of Wikipedia visits, and the endogenous variable is Nasdaq index return. As an alternative to this approach, an algorithmic trading system has been developed. It uses Wikipedia visits as investment signals for long and short positions to check the predictability power of this indicator. It is determined that the volume of queries about Nasdaq companies is a statistically significant variable for expressing the evolution of this index. However, it has no predictive capacity. Keeping in mind the capacity of Wikipedia to exemplify Nasdaq trends, further studies should be conducted to determine how to make this indicator profitable.