How to Research Companies
These resources will help you make sense of the information you find about companies.
- Dirt Diggers Digest Guide to Strategic Corporate Research (Corporate Research Project)The revised and expanded version of Corporate Research Project's classic guide to company and industry research, tailored to labor and grassroots researchers.
Understanding Financial Statements by Call Number: ILR HF5681.B2 F764 2010ISBN: 9780136086246Publication Date: 2009-03-03'Understanding Financial Statements' retains its reputation for readability, concise coverage, and accessibility, and gives students the conceptual background and analytical tools necessary to understand and interpret business financial statements. This is a good introduction to how the numbers in financial statements were arrived at, and what they mean.
- Doing Company Research (LOC)A succint overview of sources and strategies for researching companies, including publicly traded and privately owned firms, as well as international companies.
Finding News Sources
The article databases below will provide comprehensive and reliable information about companies. Try searching the specific COMPANY search field, and add terms like "labor unions" or "wages" or "collective bargaining" or "profits" to further target your search.
- ABI/InformABI Inform is an extensive international business and management database, contains bibliographic citations, abstracts, and full text of articles appearing in professional publications, academic journals, and trade magazines published worldwide. Also known as ProQuest.
- FactivaFull-text online service for international news and business information. Covers over 28,000 sources in 23 languages in more than 150 countries. Some company and market research is included. Factiva includes full-text coverage of the Wall Street Journal.
- Nexis UniProvides access to full text resources on topics including current and general news; business and financial information; newspapers; company directories; government and politics; medical and health topics; accounting, auditing, and tax; federal and state laws; legal cases; and regulations. Resources include TV and radio news transcripts.
Organizational Information
Learn about the organization you are engaging with. Identify gross revenues, headquarters location, and ownership structure. Determine the profitability of companies or the financial health of nonprofits. Examine key financial ratios to benchmark your organization with those that are similar.
- Gale Business: InsightsExtensive reference content from Gale's core business collection; easy-to-use company fundamentals and investment research reports; industry rankings, profiles, market share data, company histories, and more.
- Business Source CompleteBusiness Source Complete provides full text for scholarly business journals and other sources, including full text for more than 1,800 peer-reviewed business publications. Coverage includes virtually all subject areas related to business. This database provides full text (PDF) for top scholarly journals, including the Harvard Business Review. It also includes industry and country reports from Euromonitor and company and industry reports from Datamonitor.
- Capital IQCapital IQ is a major financial platform used to find data on public and private companies, investment firms, capital transactions, and people. It includes financials for over 88,000 public companies and 825,000 private companies.
- Edgar (SEC)All companies, foreign and domestic, are required to file registration statements, periodic reports, and other forms electronically through EDGAR. Here you'll find links to a complete list of filings available through EDGAR and instructions for searching the EDGAR database. Filings cover 1996-present.
- Executive Paywatch (AFL-CIO)AFL-CIO's monitor of executive pay. Choose corporation from index, to obtain CEO's total compensation package, and compare workers' salaries to those of their CEOs.
- GuideStar PremiumSearchable directory that provides detailed information on more than 850,000 nonprofit (501) organizations. Profiles cover mission and programs, financials, leaders, and most importantly, full text via PDF of the charity's IRS 990 filing from 1998 forward in most cases. Form 990 provides information on revenues, expenses, programs, activities, executive salaries and board members. Parts of the database are only available to licensed institutions, but the site contains significant free content. Access to some free content requires registration
- Lexis+ (Lexis Plus)ILR School only.
Full version of LexisNexis. Available only by creating username and password after training by Catherwood staff. Formerly Lexis Advance. - LexisNexis Corporate AffiliationsILR Library HG 4057 A21
New Providence, NJ: National Register Publishing. 5 vols.
Provides information on U.S. and international public and private companies. The Cross-Index references subsidiaries with parent companies.
ILR School:Access through Lexis Advance account by selecting Company and Financial>Company Profiles>LexisNexis Corporate Affiliations.
- Mergent IntellectMergent Intellect is a highly flexible web-based application that features a deep collection of worldwide business information that enables companies to generate insightful business intelligence. Coupling Mergent's expertise in developing products for the reference marketplace with D&B's private company database, Mergent Intellect offers new and existing clients a unique opportunity to access private and public U.S and international business data, industry news, facts and figures, executive contact information, the ability to access industry profiles and much more.
- OrbisProvides access to company information and financial data for more than 275 million companies worldwide. Users can screen for companies based on geography, financial performance, industry, deals, ownership structure, number of employees, year of incorporation, and other criteria. Orbis is an excellent source for private company information, especially in international markets.
- WorkspaceWorkspace (from Refinitiv) is a financial research platform that provides company financials, market data, transaction data, and analyst reports (Aftermarket Research). Students, faculty, and staff will need to register for an account using a Cornell email address.
- MSCI ESG DirectA comprehensive research database, measuring the environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance of corporations. The web-based database contains ESG and controversial business involvement research on more than 4,000 companies in 50+ global markets. The database provides over 200 ESG indicators and over 2,000 ESG points. It provides continuous global coverage for involvement in controversial lines of business, such as nuclear power, tobacco, and weapons. Previously known as ESG Manager on Campus.