Welcome to Business Research Plus

From specialist databases to business literature, Business Research Plus provides advice and tips based on the MBS library service resources and expertise.  See our About page for more details.

Exploring our resources - try the MBS library service website eResources tab,  scroll down to category or tag cloud in the right-hand column, or search Manchester Business Answers 24/7 (FAQ). For latest news see @MBSLibrary Follow @MBSLibrary.

Business Research Plus now has a page for easier access when using your mobile device - http://bizlib247.wordpress.com/mobile-view/ [24 Sept 2012]

(Manchester Business School (MBS) Library Service is part of The University of Manchester Library. )

Social Media Report 2012 and eScholar

After reading the post “Social Media Report 2012” (Academic Trend & Innovations blog, Doriot Library, INSEAD Business School), and the Nielsen report it highlights, I have been thinking about social media and research. There are at least three aspects:

• Research into the impact of social media on businesses and the world of work in general
• The use of social media by academic researchers and research communities
• Social media as part of the online presence of academic libraries

The Nielsen report provides a useful overview – but so general that it made me want to find something more specific. Manchester eScholar identified some University of Manchester research:

• Hughes, D. H., Rowe, M. Batey, M. & Lee, A (2012) “A tale of two sites: Twitter vs. Facebook and the personality predictors of social media usage” Computers in Human Behavior, 28(2) pp. 561-569.  DOI:10.1016/j.chb.2011.11.001 - Manchester eScholar. (For full-text use FindIt@UML for Computers in Human Behavior)
• Demetriou, G. (2012) Organisational Social Media Platforms: exploring user participation behaviours in software and technology firms. PhD Thesis, The University of Manchester, Manchester eScholarID:157374
• Zhu, Y, and Proctor, R. (2012) “Use of blogs, Twitter and Facebook by PhD Students for Scholarly Communication: A UK study”. In: 2012 China New Media Communication Association Annual Conference, Macao International Conference ; 06 Dec 2012-08 Dec 2012; Macao, Manchester eScholarID:187789
• Tuten, T. and Solomon, M. (2012) Social Media Marketing. Upper Saddle River, NJ USA: Pearson Education. eScholarID:157026 (UoM Library catalogue entry)

The Nielsen report did mention that an increasing number of people are using social media as their medium of choice for contacting companies. So far I have not been able to find any research on this topic.

Please leave details if there is research you recommend on any of the three aspects above.

Fake Tweet and Intraday Data

A fake tweet from the hacked Twitter account of Associated Press caused a sharp drop in US markets in afternoon trading (on 23 April 2013). (BBC Business News – Fake terror tweet hits US markets)

You can see the effect on the market using Bloomberg Professional to chart intra day data for an index (S&P 500 below) or individual share.

Bloomberg Line Chart S&P 500 for 23 April 2013 (UK times) – (click to expand)

Bloomberg News also has a report “Associated Press Twitter Account Hacked in Market Moving Attack” (Bloomberg News April 24 05:01).

We should probably not consider it surprising that social media has the power to influence markets, nor that there is a tendency for traders to react first and they check the authenticity of information.

Bloomberg Professional has a function TWTR (Twitter Filter Builder) that allows users to build a twitter filter according to how they want to monitor the market – including seeing what is trending on Bloomberg Social Velocity (BSV).

Search for “Twitter” on Bloomberg DOCS and one document offered is “Chapter 3: Lessons Learned from Social Media” (Halloran and Thies, 2012).

References

Halloran, M. and Thies, C. (2012) “Chapter 3: Lessons Learned from Social Media” from The Social Media Handbook for Financial Advisors: How to Use LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter to Build and Grow Your Business.  Available at: Bloomberg Professional Service [online subscription service] (Accessed 24 April 2013).

Eureka! Innovation Challenge Event 2013

 

The wait is nearly over!

We asked you to send in your ideas or vision for an innovative new concept or design which will enhance the customer experience within The University of Manchester Library.

You responded in your hundreds and now the shortlisting is complete, invitations have been sent to our eight finalists and we’re counting down to Eureka! The Final!

Ortis Deley, best known as a presenter of The Gadget Show, will present the finalists to an impressive panel of judges on Thursday, 2 May in the Kanaris Lecture Theatre. Following an afternoon of pitches and presentations, a winner will be selected.

“We’ve had so many great ideas and we’ve been absolutely delighted by the quality, range, and diversity of entries”, said Nick Campbell, Eureka! organiser.

“Shortlisting has been tough but it’s now up to the judges to decide which one’s the winner!”

Meanwhile, proving that good ideas can be as  simple as they are innovative, some non-winning suggestions will also be taken up by the Library and put in place soon.

As Nick says, “As a leading university we’re always seeking improvements. Thankfully, we have some of the world’s leading students with great ideas too!”

Come and see the presentations and judging for yourself.

Book your FREE ticket now:

http://eurekathefinal.eventbrite.com/

Datastream searching for book to market

A query this morning uncovered a situation where some care is needed when searching in Thomson Reuters Datastream.

We were looking for the “book to market” value for a company. It turns out that Datastream does not have this datatype. It does have Market To Book Value (MTBV), but even this can be difficult to find.

• If you search for name contains “book” you get 618 results – rather a lot to scroll through
• If you search for name contains “market” you get 205 results – still a lot to scroll through
• If you search for name contains “book market” you get 0 (zero) results -
• Using both search boxes for name contains “book” AND name contains “market” will give you Market To Book Value (MTBV)

DS Navigator search (click to expand)

After finding Market To Book Value (MTBV) you can get “book to market”:

• the inverse – book to market = 1/MTBV
• use constituents and calculate – book to market = WC03501/MV (ordinary (common) equity / market value)
• use constituents and Datastream expression

Related tips:

Datastream, Worldscope and Units (August 2011, updated April 2013)

Worldscope accounting data – finding data tips (July 2011)

Chairman’s optimism and future return uncorrelated?

chairman’s statement optimism and following year return (click to expand)

This scatterplot shows the relationship between the percentage total return in the following year (RetP1) and the optimism of the chairman’s statement in the annual report (Optim). In general it appears that increased optimism only corresponds with increased variability in returns.

This has only been done for a small sample of 29 FTSE 100 companies over the years 2006-2011. The main purpose was to provide an example of analysis using textual, rather than numeric, information in company annual reports.

Steps followed:

1. Identify the FTSE 100 companies at 31 December 2011. [Historical FTSE 100 Index constituents (July 2012)]
2. Obtain the annual reports for a sample of these companies. [Where can I find current and historical company annual reports?]
3. Convert the annual reports from PDF to Text.
4. Extract the chairman’s statement from each report.  (This could only be done manually one report at a time)
5. Analyse the statements using the text analysis software Diction.
6. Link the results from Diction with the total return (obtained from Datastream) for the same and following year [Total shareholder return (July 2011)].

From a library perspective the main interest is the research process rather than the results, and specifically the data collection needed to assemble a dataset for analysis (steps 1-4 above). Researchers have to work hard to transform the raw data available to them into a dataset ready for analysis.

Related Research

Manchester academic research in a similar area -

Schleicher, T.  (2012) “When is good news really good news?” Accounting and Business Research 42, no. 5, pp, 1-27. eScholarID:158855 | DOI:10.1080/00014788.2012.685275

Schleicher, T., Walker, M. (2010)  ”Bias in the tone of forward-looking narratives.” Accounting and Business Research 40, no. 4, pp. 371-390. eScholarID:75654 | DOI:10.1080/00014788.2010.9995318

Further exploring our small sample dataset

Another scatterplot showing the relationship between the percentage total return in the current year and the optimism of the chairman’s statement shows a similar lack of correlation.

Summary stats (click to expand)

Looking at both the certainty and the optimism that is measured in the chairmen’s statements, this small sample shows that a certainty below average and an optimism below average give a total return in the following year, and in the current year, that higher.

This is only  a small sample, and we have no theory why selecting companies because their chairman’s statement is uncertain and pessimistic should be better than random selection.

Worldscope – coverage and data definitions

Worldscope is the global company accounts “database” from Thomson Reuters and thus a key research resource for company information. It is accessed using either Datastream (active and inactive companies) or Thomson One Banker (active companies only).

Worldscope is designed to allow comparison of companies that report under different accounting rules worldwide. In addition, it records company information using four templates: banks, industrial companies, insurance companies and other financial companies. This means that many of Worldscope’s datatypes only have values for a subset of the companies covered (e.g. US companies).

For full details of the Worldscope methodology and the definitions of the datatypes you can consult the Worldscope Data Definitions Guide (Issue 14) available from the Datastream Extranet.

The Worldscope Coverage Report, also available from the Datastream Extranet, for 28th Feb 2013 includes the following coverage information:

• Argentina – total companies 144, active 105, inactive 39
• Australia – total companies 2903, active 1957, inactive 946
• …
• United Kingdom – total companies 5093, active 1890, inactive 3203
• United States – total companies 21130, active 9175, inactive 11955
• All countries – total companies 74757, active 46704, inactive 28053

Worldscope Data Definitions Guide from Datastream Extranet (click to expand)

The Worldscope Data Definitions Guide (Issue 14) and Worldscope Coverage Report are also available in the folder Database Manuals\Worldscope when using the database PCs in the Eddie Davies Library

Related Worldscope posts:

• Worldscope – company accounts data definitions (April 2011)
• Datastream, Worldscope and Units (August 2011)
• Worldscope accounting data – finding data tips (July 2011)

Worldscope is not the only database for company accounts (financials) – for example Compustat, available through WRDS,  is very popular with researchers studying US companies and Bloomberg’s Financial Analysis (FA) function gives company account information.

• Where can I find company financials, e.g., balance sheets etc.?

The term “company financials” is often used rather than “company accounts”.

Art and Corporate Social Responsibility (Unilever)

Visiting the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight I realised that this was an early example of corporate social responsibilty (CSR). The gallery was founded by William Hesketh Lever and dedicated to the memory of his wife Elizabeth. Lever believed in the ability of art to enrich the lives of individuals and communities, especially his workers in the purpose-built Port Sunlight village.

Lever was also conscious of his company brand and no doubt aware that the gallery was excellent for his image as a model victorian employer. He is also famous for choosing some of the paintings be bought because they were suitable for his Sunlight Soap adverts. The famous image on the right comes from the painting The New Frock by William Powell Frith and as a famous sunight soap advert it can be see in the post “So Clean” on Karen Lee’s blog.

For definitions of Corporate Social Responsibility:

• Dahlsrud, A. (2008), “How corporate social responsibility is defined: an analysis of 37 definitions”, Corporate Social Responsibility and  Environmental Management, 15(1), pp. 1–13 , Available at: doi: 10.1002/csr.132  (Accessed: 7 April 2013).
• University of Manchester Library catalogue corporate social responsibility electronic resources

For current Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) talking points:

• Forbes – The CSR blog
• Mallen Baker’s CSR blog

For MBS/University of Manchester research try Manchester eScholar corporate AND social AND responsibility

The image above right is the cover of – Lewis, B. (2008) So Clean: Lord Leverhulme, soap and civilisation. Manchester: Manchester University Press. [University of Manchester Library catalogue link for Lewis 2008 "So Clean..." ]

PS. Lord Leverhulme’s soap company, Lever Brothers Limited, joined with a Dutch company, Naamlooze Vennootschap Margarine Uniein, in 1930 to become Unilever – a company better known by its brands than by its own name. For details see Understanding [Unilever] NV & PLC shares.