Sunday, July 3, 2022

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Aggregation Functions

How to Smooth Data by Using the TREND Function

Charley Kyd -
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Years ago, I read that Prof. William S. Cleveland had suggested that data could be smoothed by calculating a centered trendline through adjacent data—a...
Two economists have introduced a new leading indicator, which predicts a recession soon. These Excel charts illustrate their insight. If they're correct, Excel users will be very busy in the months ahead.

Consumer Sentiment Suggests a 2022 Recession

Your data can contain many important, hidden patterns. But simple transformations in Excel can help to reveal them—as this example illustrates.

Simple Transformations Can Reveal Hidden Patterns in Your Data

As inflation rises, so do mortgage interest rates—causing house prices to fall. Here's how Excel's PV function can help you estimate what you new house price will be.

Here’s How Inflation Could Affect the Value of Your Home

A shortage of truckers is one cause of the supply chain crisis in the US. This Excel chart suggests that the problem won't end soon.

An Excel Chart of a Major U.S. Supply Chain Problem

Featured Articles

Your data can contain many important, hidden patterns. But simple transformations in Excel can help to reveal them—as this example illustrates.

Simple Transformations Can Reveal Hidden Patterns in Your Data

Analytical Methods Charley Kyd -
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Excel users have at least two significant advantages over business professionals who rely on other analytical and reporting tools. First advantage: We Excel users can...
Use this unique Excel dashboard to track the general rate of inflation, your personal rate, and the rate of the goods and services you buy.

Inflation Tracker Excel Dashboard with Consumer Prices

Business & Economics Charley Kyd -
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U.S. President John F. Kennedy once said of a growing economy, "A rising tide lifts all boats." However, a rising inflationary tide does not lift...
Using Excel's LET, SORTBY, and SEQUENCE functions, and dynamic arrays, you easily can list any number of top and bottom results from a Table.

How to Report Top and Bottom Results Using Dynamic Arrays in Excel

Array Formulas Charley Kyd -
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In How to Use Excel’s LET Function, I showed several examples of a powerful function that Microsoft added to Excel 365 in the summer...
How to aggregate named groups of GL accounts.

How to Report GL Account Groups in Excel

Accounting & Finance Charley Kyd -
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Believe it or not, this income statement is quite sophisticated. It's not nearly as simple-minded as it looks. In fact, this income statement illustrates a...
In Excel, you can report named groups of GL account numbers, product codes, and so on—just as you report one such number. Here’s how.

How to Use Array Formulas to Report Groups of Accounts

Accounting & Finance Charley Kyd -
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Often, in accounting, marketing, and other departments, we'd like to report and analyze groups of items rather than one item at a time. In Part...

Blog

As inflation rises, so do mortgage interest rates—causing house prices to fall. Here's how Excel's PV function can help you estimate what you new house price will be.
Blog

Here’s How Inflation Could Affect the Value of Your Home

Charley Kyd -
0
November 5, 2021 Inflation is rising in the U.S. And that made me wonder how a higher rate of inflation could affect the price of...
A shortage of truckers is one cause of the supply chain crisis in the US. This Excel chart suggests that the problem won't end soon.

An Excel Chart of a Major U.S. Supply Chain Problem

A Lesson in Excel Analysis Learned from Rising US Inflation

Here's how you can split delimited text into an array with a short Excel formula, and then wrap the formula with the INDEX function to return any value from the array.

How to Split and Index Delimited Text with Excel Formulas

Berkshire Hathaway is raising prices, and their costs are increasing. Inflation is on the rise. These Excel charts illustrate the the problem.

Warren Buffett, Inflation, and Excel

Business & Economics

These Excel column charts of employment, business lending, and freight shipments show mixed signals about the current health of the US economy.
Blog

Excel Bar Charts with Economic Indicators

Charley Kyd -
0
The Excel figure below shows three indicators of the US economy. Two show economic improvements and one doesn't. The Excel Perspective Using column charts rather than...
Excel's STOCKHISTORY function can return decades of history about the prices of stocks for thousands of public companies from many countries. Here's an introduction to that function.

Introducing Excel’s STOCKHISTORY Function

In finance, breakeven charts illustrate how your fixed and variable costs vary with your monthly sales. Here's how to set up break-even charts in Excel.

Map Costs and Sales in Excel with a Classic Breakeven Chart

Here's how to add sources and uses of funds to your company's Balance Sheet in Excel to get a clearer picture of how the changes affect your cash flow.

Use this Excel ‘Cash Flow Balance Sheet’ to See Sources &...

Several business magazines offer great examples of how to use charts to communicate business data. But sadly, at times, they show us what NOT to do.

Good Examples of Bad Charts: Chart Junk from a Surprising Source

Formulas & Functions

Beginning in Excel 2016 in Office 365, your formulas can set gaps in your line and scatter charts. Here are two ways to use the feature in your reports.
Analytical Methods

Two Business Uses for Excel’s New Chart Feature

Charley Kyd -
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For decades, I've been whining about the need for Excel to have some way for our formulas to specify a gap in line and...
Does Excel's INDEX worksheet function work for you only some of the time? Here are ways to learn why your INDEX function isn't working as you expect.

How to Debug INDEX in Excel

We can't push around numbers all the time with Excel. Sometimes, we just need to goof off. So here are some examples of business cartoons I drew in Excel.

Use Excel’s Drawing Tools to Create Your Own Cartoons

Excel's absolute cell references, like $A$1, confuse many Excel users. But the explanation is easy. Each dollar signs serv only one important purpose.

How to Use Absolute and Relative Cell References in Excel Formulas

An article in the Wall Street Journal about babies born during the winter months offers some great advice about charts for Excel users in business.

Excel Charts, Seasonality, & Analysis: Five Lessons from the WSJ

Excel Methods

I used the FILTER function to give me IFS-like power for PERCENTILE.INC. But then I realized the same pattern brings IFS-like power to many functions—including MEDIAN, STDEV.S, GEOMEAN, and perhaps even the FORECAST functions!
Aggregation Functions

Using the Hidden Power of Excel’s FILTER Function

Charley Kyd -
0
When you take the time to explore a new worksheet function, it's amazing what you can discover! And I won't tell you about the really...
Here's how to calculate the annual rate of inflation both by comparing prices several years apart, and by several months apart.

How to Calculate Inflation in Three Different Ways

As inflation rises, so do mortgage interest rates—causing house prices to fall. Here's how Excel's PV function can help you estimate what you new house price will be.

Here’s How Inflation Could Affect the Value of Your Home

These tables summarize the performance of Excel's 15 worksheet functions use different methods to round data.

Overview of Excel’s Rounding Functions

In Excel, you can report named groups of GL account numbers, product codes, and so on—just as you report one such number. Here’s how.

How to Use Array Formulas to Report Groups of Accounts

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Popular

When you bring data from another source into an Excel worksheet, the data often includes rows that you’ll want to delete. Here's the first of two methods.

How to Delete Blank or Unneeded Rows, Method 1

Worksheet Interaction Charley Kyd -
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When you bring data from another source into an Excel worksheet, the data often includes rows that you’ll want to delete. Often, you’ll want...
When you want to look up data in Excel, you should never use a worksheet function with "lookup" in its name. Here's why...

Why INDEX-MATCH Is Far Better Than VLOOKUP or HLOOKUP in Excel

Downloads Charley Kyd -
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(Download the workbook.) Excel’s VLOOKUP function is more popular than the INDEX-MATCH function combination, probably because when Excel users need to look up data then a "lookup" function...
Excel provides several worksheet functions for working with normal distributions or 'bell-shaped curves.' This introduction to Excel's Normal Distribution functions offers help for the statistically challenged.

An Introduction to Excel’s Normal Distribution Functions

Business Statistics Charley Kyd -
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(Download the workbook.) When a visitor asked me how to generate a random number from a Normal distribution she set me to thinking about doing statistics...
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