SBS 490 Israel, Spring 2020: Company Research

Public Companies:

Note the ticker symbol, NAICS and SIC codes, and exchange on which the company's stock is traded. Publicly traded companies are required by law to disclose financial information to the Securities and Exchange Commission, and therefore public companies are much easier to research.

If the Company is Identified as being Private:

Since privately held companies are not traded on stock exchanges, they are not required to divulge any financial information, hence finding extensive information on a private company can be difficult. Business publications are often the best source of information on a private company's activities.

Subsidiaries and Affiliates:

Company data analysis only pertains to publicly traded, parent companies. A company's subsidiaries are not analysed individually. Try searching the parent company's annual reports, and business news and journals, for information on the activities of a subsidiary.

Mergent Online's Company details section provides basic information about the company including a summary of business activities, financial overview, and key executive information with links to detailed profiles describing those executives' background and activities within the company. The Reports section connects the user to annual reports as well as providing an additional link to industry information. Other sections in this report dig deep and can provide detailed information for specialized research needs For example, the Supply chain section can connect the user to a list of competing companies in the Oncology sector, as well as potentially competing products within that category.

It can be tough to locate extensive data on a privately held company. In this example, Mergent Intellect provides basic company information including the parent company's name, NAICS codes, and available financial details. The NAICS code can be especially helpful in further database searches.

When searching a privately held company, Standard & Poor's strength is to provide data on comparable companies. The landing page, Tearsheet provides a one-stop spot for key business information including description of the business, links to profiles of key executives, and latest relevant news headlines. Use the left-hand navigation links to expand on comparable data categories such as "Industry Classifications" and "Quick Comps".