Try:

=LEFT(A1,FIND("|",A1)-1)
--
Gary''s Student - gsnu2007h


" wrote:

I need to extract stock symbols from a web query into their own cells.

Here are some examples of the raw data that is imported:

ACAS|AMERICAN CAP, STRATETIES LTD|Q|Y|N|
CT|Capital Trust, Inc.|NYSE|Y||
ENY|Claymore/SWM Canadian Energy Income Index ETF|Amex|Y||

I just need the ticker. This would be the first one to five
characters in the string. The string is always delineated by the "|"
symbol.

I would love to do it using functions (I am not that handy with VBA).

Thanks

Dan