Well you are incorrect with that assumption, formulas can look for anything you want, OK I admit it might not be as quick as using a database but you can do complex reports to search for very limited filtered information.
Well once again you are incorrect. There is approximately 260 to 262 days in a year that the stock market trades. Using the columns across from C to XFB is 16,380 trading days or else 62.5 yrs worth of data 2000 rows down. Now I admit that is a hell of a lot of data and the file would be huge. But in all seriousness 5yrs worth of data is all you really need.
Once again this is where formulas come into play. If you know how to type up a formula to match the pattern / trends you are looking for it can be done.
Pulling data out and converting in to graphs is easy as, once again you use formulas to collect the data from a specific date.
A database is just a spreadsheet that is "hidden" in the end. As long as you have the information on hand you can sort / filter / track / scan / look for patterns... you just have to know how to setup you spreadsheet to do it.
I'll agree with you on 1 thing though.... Using a database is a quicker option but by no means it is the only way.
