Refreshing XBRL data from within VBA

[Peter Guldberg]

Is there a way to make an XBRL query refresh when you are within an Excel-VBA sub?

When you are running a VBA sub, and this changes a cell that the XBRL query is dependent on, the XBRL fields change to #BUSY!, and they do not update until the macro has actually finished.

[David Tauriello]

Hi Peter – an Excel user who’s worked with VBA wrote and would like to know a bit more about what you’re trying to accomplish in VBA.

Can you post a rough set of steps for this interaction?

[Peter Guldberg]

Ok, let me try to explain:

I have a worksheet where I input the CIK for one specific issuer.
This pulls a list into the worksheet of all of the 10-Q and 10-K reports by that issuer.
For the oldest report the worksheet then pulls in the facts from that report that are relevant to me.

So far, no VBA, just XBRL.showData() functions in the worksheet.

I then want to use VBA to do the following steps:

1. Store the relevant facts, mentioned above, in my own DB.

2. Select the next-oldest report from the worksheet, and make the worksheet pull in the relevant facts from that report into the worksheet, still using the XBRL.showData() Function.

3. Go back to step 1.

This works fine for the first/oldest report, but once we get to the next report the XBRL.showData() function does not update. It just displays #BUSY!, because the VBA-macro is still running.
Once the VBA stops running, the function updates almost immediately.

In Google Sheets with App Script this does work as long as you insert pauses that allows the function to update.

[David Tauriello]

Peter – thanks for taking a look at the materials I passed in email from another XBRL US Member. I sent along your appreciation for his efforts in using the data.

We’re working out how to provide face financial data through endpoints to the XBRL API – stay tuned.

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