XBRL and open data for global financial ecosystems: A linked data approach

Information professionals performing business activity related investigative analysis must routinely associate data from a diverse range of Web based general-interest business and financial information sources. XBRL has become an integral part of the financial data landscape. At the same time, Open Data initiatives have contributed relevant financial, economic, and business data to the pool of publicly available information on the Web but the use of XBRL in combination with Open Data remains at an early state of realisation. In this paper we argue that Linked Data technology, created for Web scale information integration, can accommodate XBRL data and make it easier to combine it with open datasets. This can provide the foundations for a global data ecosystem of interlinked and interoperable financial and business information with the potential to leverage XBRL beyond its current regulatory and disclosure role. We outline the uses of Linked Data technologies to facilitate XBRL consumption in conjunction with non-XBRL Open Data, report on current activities and high-light remaining challenges in terms of information consolidation faced by both XBRL and Web technologies. (c) 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.