I am trying to convert a pandas dataframe containing date in YYYYMM format to YYYYQ format as below

import pandas as pd
dat = pd.DataFrame({'date' : ['200612']})
pd.PeriodIndex(pd.to_datetime(dat.date), freq='Q')

However this generates output as 2012Q2, whereas correct output should be 2006Q4

What is the right way to get correct Quarter?

>Solution :

Explicitly specific the input format:

dat = pd.DataFrame({'date' : ['200612']})
pd.PeriodIndex(pd.to_datetime(dat.date, format='%Y%m'), freq='Q')

Output:

PeriodIndex(['2006Q4'], dtype='period[Q-DEC]', name='date')