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CMR 244: Company Information
What to Know
Not all companies will have a lot of information available! It depends on whether it is a 'public company' or a 'private company.' What's the difference? Public companies, or publicly-traded companies, "often referred to as reporting companies, are subject to reporting requirements and must file certain reports, including annual, quarterly, and current reports, with the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) on an ongoing basis." [Source: SEC] More information on public companies from Investopedia.
Private companies are 'privately held' meaning that, in most cases, the company is owned by its founders, management, or a group of private investors. [Source: Investopedia]. Private companies are not required to provide as much information as publicly-traded companies.
The subscription databases Miami University Libraries provides will have information on both public and private companies, but the depth of information will vary. The databases will tell you whether a company is public or private, but that information is also available online in freely-available sources like Wikipedia and others.
Sources for Company Information
- Hoover's D&B Business Browser This link opens in a new windowThis resource provides U.S. and international company and industry information. This source includes company financial data and corporate family trees, information on competitors, SWOT analyses, and analyst reports. Previously known as OneSource. 50 simultaneous users.
- Mergent Online This link opens in a new windowA source for financial data on 15,000 US and 20,000 international publicly held companies. Includes a business description, history, company financials, property, subsidiaries, officers and directors, long-term debt and capital stock data, as well as historical stock price data. Financial data for the last 15 years is available, as well as the latest 5-10 years of annual reports. Company archives include data on inactive companies back to 1996. Mergent also now has an economic module which contains time series data on 550 U.S. and international economic variables.
- Marketline This link opens in a new windowMarketline consists of reports on 10,000 companies in the US and internationally, as well as 2,000 industry reports and in-depth country and city reports. It also includes mergers & acquisitions data.
- Business Source Complete This link opens in a new windowIndexes and abstracts a number of scholarly business journals, the majority of which are available in full-text. Also includes company, industry, and country reports covering both domestic and international. Covers the subject areas of management, economics, finance, accounting, international business, and marketing.
