Business Resources at the John M. Pfau Library

Les Kong

Company Research

• Public or private?

• Diversified?

• Majority of business within a single industry?

Public Companies

• Issue stock• Must file detailed financial reports with

the Securities and Exchange Commission

• Info: Public filings (Mergent Online, Factiva, Lexis-Nexis), annual reports, newspaper/magazine articles

Private Companies

• Do not issue stock

• Report financial information to the IRS (information not available to public)

• Info: newspaper/magazine articles, directories (Hoover’s, Lexis-Nexis)

Company Research

• Want to compare the company to others in the same industry?

• How to identify an industry?

• How to determine what part of a company's profits and expenses are related to that industry?

Finding a peer group for purposes of comparison

• Examine a financial report of the company and find the SIC or NAICS codes

• Use Mergent Online, Hoover's, or S & P's Industry Surveys to find companies in the same industry

Industry Ratios

• RMA Annual Statement Studies (data by NAICS, asset size of company)

• Industry Norms & Key Business Ratios (data by SIC, no breakout by asset size, most current data)

• Almanac of Business & Industrial Financial Ratios (data by NAICS, based on IRS data)

Data Sources

• Industry ratios: RMA Annual Statement Studies, Industry Norms & Key Business Ratios, Almanac of Business & Industrial Financial Ratios

• Company Data: Standard & Poor's Industry Surveys, Mergent Online, Factiva, SEC EDGAR filings, Yahoo, newspapers, Value Line, annual reports

More Data Comparisons

• Betas: Value Line, Standard & Poor’s Stock Reports, Yahoo

• Market Share: Business Snapshots N.A., DataMonitor, RDS Business Suite (TableBase)

• Export.gov Trade Development Site: http://www.ita.doc.gov/td/td_home/tdhome.html

Locating Articles

• Magazines/newspapers: Factiva, Business Source Premier, ABI/Inform Global, Lexis-Nexis

• Wall Street Journal

Questions?Contact me:

• Les Kong

• lkong@csusb.edu

• (909) 537-5111