Archive
New online resources
You may not have seen many updates on Business Research Plus lately. That’s because we have been busy working on a new set of online resources…
The business data online resources are written to help students and researchers to make effective and accurate use of the specialist financial and business databases available at The University of Manchester. They are designed to help you to help yourselves, where possible.
If you find that these guides are not enough, you may wish to search Library Help for previous asked questions, or our blog Business Research Plus for older posts that go into much more detail.
How are the guides organised?
Visit the list on the Library website for an index of all the guides. They are organised into the following topics.
WRDS website and access (updated October 2015)
(This post is a new version of WRDS website and access, July 2010)
WRDS (Wharton Research Data Service) is not really a database itself. It is a system designed to give researchers access to a range of financial databases (CRSP, Compustat, CCM, Compustat Execucomp, LSPD) though a common interface, and with integrated support.
Access to WRDS is via a username and password. Some taught modules provide students with a “class account” (such as Advanced Empirical Finance). MSc students, PhD students and academic staff can apply for their own username and password by following the instructions below. (Choosing the account type as PhD or Faculty provides extra capabilities for running SAS programs on the WRDS system.)
Creating a WRDS account (postgraduate students)
For instructions to apply for your own username and password, please see the following guide.
- Go to WRDS start page.
- Under the login boxes, click on link Register for a WRDS Account.
- Fill in the details as follows:
- Institution: University of Manchester
- Affiliation With Institution: Masters Student | Ph.D. Student
- First Name: your first name
- Last Name: your last name
- Email: must be your University email address
- Department: your school and division name
- Desired Username: University username mxxxxxxx is recommended
- When Do You Expect Your Degree?: End date from your library card
- Press Submit.
- An email will be sent to our library admin staff who should activate your account within 24 hours.
- You will receive an email explaining that your account has been activated. It will include a default password that you can change.
Creating a WRDS account (staff)
In Step 3.2 Affiliation With Institution, choose Faculty, Staff (IT/Librarian) or Research Assistant. If you are a ‘Research Assistant’, please also provide the name and email address of your supervisor. Lecturers and professors should choose ‘Faculty’; PSS, Library and IT staff should choose ‘Staff’.
Creating a WRDS account (undergraduate students)
In order for undergraduate students to have access to WRDS, a ‘Class’ account must be created by a lecturer for the subject your are undertaking. Ask your lecturer if you think you need this; they will need to follow the same steps as above except choose ‘Class’ in Step 3.2 and provide the course code.
Where can I find a company’s date of incorporation or year founded?
For UK companies
In Fame, the date of incorporation in the Company report, under the Legal & accounts information section.
For US companies
Use Field-Ritter Dataset of Company Founding Dates (Firms going public in the US 1975-2014, last updated 14 April 2014)
For companies in any country
In Datastream, Use a Static Request and the Worldscope datatypes:
- WC18272 – Date Company Founded
- WC18273 – Date of Incorporation
Finding working papers
There are many relevant sources for working papers, including:
- Manchester Business School (MBS) Working Papers (2001 onwards)
- Bank of England Working Papers
- Cambridge Judge Business School Working Papers
- Cambridge Centre for Financial Analysis & Policy Working Papers
- EBSLG Working Papers European Business Schools Librarians’ Group (EBSLG) Working Papers
- Harvard Business School Working Knowledge Working Papers
- IMD (International Institute for Management Development) Working Papers
- IMF (International Monetary Fund) Working Papers
- London Business School Faculty Research Working Papers
- NBER Working Papers (the National Bureau of Economic Research)
- SSRN (Social Sciences Research Network) eLibrary and Partners in Publishing (papers by publisher)
- Wharton Financial Institutions Center
- Olin Business School’s Links to Working Papers in Business
- Business Source Premier (EBSCO): choose Document type of Working Paper
- EconPapers provides access to economics working papers
Insider trading
Definition of Insider Trading (from Investopedia):
The buying or selling of a security by someone who has access to material, nonpublic information about the security.
Companies in any country
Use ThomsonONE.com
- Search for the company you want.
- Click on the Company Analysis > Ownership folder, and select Insider Holdings or Insider Transactions report.
- Click “Click here for full history” for historic holdings (older than 24 months).
Use Capital IQ
- Search for the company you want.
- On the long menu down the left, choose Investors > Public Ownership, then the Insider Trading tab.
- Only the last 12 months are available.
Use Bloomberg (available in the Finance Zone and Precinct Library)
- Try Bloomberg function PHDC for a specific company (e.g. VOD LN <F8> PHDC <GO>) and select Insiders, sorted by size.
- You can also look up the biographies of executies/directors (BIO) and then choose Reported Holdings.
- For stocks that have experienced the most purchases and sales by insiders, type: INSD and hit Go. Use the fields at the top of the screen to select country, time period, type of transaction. Click on a stock to display a graph of its historical prices with date of insider transactions.
- For more info, type: insider and hit the green Help key <F1>.
Companies in the U.S. only
Use WRDS
- Choose Thomson Reuters database, and then Insiders Data. Search by company ticker. Check the variables you want in your report.
Others
- Insider filings with the U.S. SEC are available through Edgar. Enter your company name or ticker symbol or CIK and Include Ownership forms.
- Insider transactions are available by issuer and reporting owner. Take a look at the website SecForm4.Com
Current and historical company annual reports
Company websites
For current annual reports, a company’s website is often the quickest and easiest option.
Databases that The University of Manchester subscribes to:
- PI Navigator: Include Annuals / 10K / 20-F (Company Reports and Accounts) in search criteria or select Perfect Filings tab and include Document Type UK Annual Reports or similar depending on your search.
- Mergent Archives: Select Search Mergent Achives for annual report search
- Thomson Research: Quick Company Search: and Content Profile, Filings
- Thomson ONE.com: Annual reports are under Filings tab
Annual reports websites
Try EDGAR for reports filed with US SEC.
Intraday quotes for equities and indices
Global source
Use Bloomberg.
For Equities and Indices:
Type the stock’s ticker symbol then hit [EQUITY] and hit <GO>
Choose: GIP – Intraday Price Graph
You can change the date and the time interval.
or
Type the index symbol then hit [INDEX], and then type GIP or GIT and hit <GO>
For example, to get intraday price intervals for the S&P 500:
SPX [INDEX] GIT and hit <GO>
Note: limited historical intraday data is available approx 900 trading days for GIP and 50 trading days for GIT.
Other sources
For US stocks, go to Wharton Research Data Services (WRDS) TAQ (New York Stock Exchange Trade and Quote, or NYSE TAQ.
For historical (1983-1992) NYSE and AMEX tick-by-tick data and for historical NASDAQ (1987-1992) tick-by-tick data, click on ISSM – Institute for the Study of Security Markets
TICKDATA provides a commercial service offering intraday data from the UK and other exchanges.
Finally, Thomson Reuters Tick History database offers global intra-day Time and Sales, Time and Quotes and Market Depth content from the 1st January 1996 for an extensive range of Equities, including their derivatives. Access to this resource is limited; please contact us.
Business Ratios
In seeking out ratios for companies I would be reluctant to use free web-based services. The University of Manchester Library pays subscriptions to allow current students and staff to use numerous specialised financial databases. These are trusted sources, used for academic research and by commercial businesses.
The following databases are easy to use for obtaining ratio data.
Thomson ONE
Once a company has been searched for (see search box highlighted) and overview screen displayed, Key Ratios are shown. There is also a link for ‘All Ratios’.
All Ratios.
It is preferable to select ‘Annual’ as Report Type – this selection option is revealed from the icon on the right of the screen. Ratios are grouped into a number of categories: Valuation Measures, Valuation, Enterprise Value, Credit Statistics, Liquidity Leverage, Profitability, Efficiency, Management Effectiveness, Dividend, Growth Rates and Stock Performance.
Fame
Search for a company and display the Report.
It is then a simple matter of scrolling down to the section on Ratios. These are grouped into a number of categories: Profitability, Operational, Structure and Per Employee.
Bloomberg Professional
On the command line (top left of the screen) type the company identifier (quote/ticker symbol: TSCO LN = Tesco PLC on the London stock exchange), category of information via yellow market sector key (F8/Equity – company related) and function code (FA for Financial Analysis), followed by the green Enter/GO key. Click on the ‘ratios’ tab.
TSCO LN F8/Equity FA ‘Ratios’ is further divided (e.g. Profitability displayed).
Hover over a ratio and right click, select ‘Definition’ for further detail (e.g. ‘Return on Common Equity’).
A different grouping of Ratios can be obtained from the Security Description [DES] function and the ‘Ratios’ tab.
Datastream
It is also possible to obtain ratio details from Datastream, but is a little more involved than the databases noted above.
A basic breakdown of a few ratios are displayed from the ‘Overview of Company Performance’ analysis option for the Equities (Company) Data Category.
More specific searches are possible for multiple Series (companies) and Datatypes (various ratios, for example) from the Excel Add-In version of Datastream.
For students at the University of Manchester we run regular Datastream training courses and other support material is available in the Database Suite.
Company and Industry Comparisons
Comparing a company to its industry is not always straightforward. There are many classification systems to group similar companies together. There are UK/US SIC [Standard Industry Classification] codes and an additional, separate one for North America [NAIC – North American Industry Classification] – just to muddy the waters! Oh, and there is another, International industry system: Global Industry Classification [GIC] developed by MSCI (Morgan Stanley Capital International and Standard & Poor’s).
Thomson ONE database shows a SIC of 5411 [Food Stores – Grocery Stores] for Tesco PLC, which is the US version (not specified) and also by economy Sector [Food & Drug Retailers] and Sub-sector [Food Retailers & Wholesalers] – this is categorised according to the ICB (Industry Classification Benchmark).
Thomson ONE allows companies to be searched for according to Industry codes: Screening & Analysis – Companies – Company Screener
Use the search window or expand the menu options:
Where a company competes against a select/limited group of competitors (which may be considered a Market – such as the UK Grocery Market), many databases provide quick quantitative comparisons.
For example, in the Fame database (UK & Ireland public/private companies), Tesco PLC has the SIC code 4711 [UK SIC (2007), Very Large Companies – retail sales in non-specialised stores with food, beverages or tobacco predominating]. Selecting the ‘Peer Report’ (Table) function allows comparison with other similar companies.
This describes the comparison as: ‘Closest 10 companies according to Turnover, for the last available year amongst the standard peer group (UK SIC 4711, Very Large Companies) – retail sales in non-specialised stores with food, beverages or tobacco predominating’. Strangely, this list doesn’t include Sainsbury or Asda, which are clearly competitors – so caution is advised when using such functions.
Thomson ONE
Company Views – Fundamentals – Comparables
This gives a list of companies in the same Industry – but again a note of caution, as this list doesn’t include Lidl or Aldi, which are competitors. Note also the tabs for additional data.
Bloomberg has the RV (Relative Valuation) function which, according to the help screen definition allows you to perform a relative valuation analysis on a single company (e.g. Tesco PLC) by comparing (benchmarking) against comparable companies in the same Market/Industry.
On the command line, type: TSCO LN F8/Equity RV Enter/GO
Depending on the area, there may also be content in the following databases:
Passport, Frost & Sullivan, IHS Connect and Freedonia.
Market Research reports can provide a valuable comparison for a company in relation to an Industry/Market. For example, breaking down by market share: Tesco PLC is often quoted as having around one third of the UK Grocery Market. Such market research is available from a number of sources, such as:
Mintel (Reports – UK coverage)
‘All’ seems to shows a familiar market breakdown – Tesco PLC 1st, but recently has been losing market share to discounters, Aldi and Lidl, which has been accentuated since this research was conducted (December 2013).
The way that research is framed is also important in considering whether you are comparing on a like-with-like basis, or close to this. Fragmentation in the market research conducted (for example, market share at physical stores only or physical stores and Internet sales combined, when producing market share values for different companies) makes this more difficult – hence the benefit of locating a report which closely matches the area of research you are interested in.
In this Market Research report, Lidl and Aldi are included in the comparison, where they weren’t in the above comparisons.
KeyNote (Reports – UK coverage).
Thomson Research (Reports [Company/Industry] – International coverage) – this is particularly good for in-depth reports, at the Company and Industry level. These reports can include SWOT analysis and other factors influencing a company’s current and future performance.
Meeting student requirements.
There is often a mismatch between what a student requires and what is available in terms of resources (business databases). In these cases, providing a solution is not always easy or apparent.
In one example, where a student asked for data on the ‘pump, bearings and gears’ industry – how companies were performing in relation to the market as a whole in the UK. I had to explain that this area didn’t represent an ‘Industry’ and therefore there would be little if any market research available. It also didn’t represent a ‘Sector’ or ‘Sub-Sector’ of the economy.
This meant that there would be limited content from database sources, which tend to organise data by individual companies, industry or sector of the economy. In this case a compromise (in terms of the analysis conducted) had to be arrived at in consultation with the student.
In summary, getting the best approach boils down to what data is available from database sources and the possibility of a student having to modify the terms of their research. This highlights a key consideration, which is often ignored – how easy is it to obtain the data that I need for my research? See additional post on this area (Research Feasibility, dated 10th February 2015, also in this Business Research Plus blog.).
The databases noted above are available to use by current students and staff of the University of Manchester.
Further Information at:
NAIC (North American Industry Classification). (Used in Thomson ONE database).
Industry Classification Benchmark [ICB]. (Used in Thomson ONE database).
Global Industry Classification [GIC] (MSCI: Morgan Stanley Capital International / Standard & Poor’s). (Used in Thomson ONE database).
UK SIC. (Used in Fame database).
http://www.siccodesupport.co.uk/
US SIC. (Used in Thomson ONE database).
https://www.osha.gov/pls/imis/sic_manual.display?id=19&tab=description
Total returns
For Global data, try Datastream.
Use datatype RI total return index, and calculate total returns from the change in this index. (see post on Total shareholder return (share price return) for details)
For active companies, the total return index datatype (DS.ReturnIndex) is also available through Thomson ONE.com.
For US data, try WRDS, and choose CRSP.
Daily and monthly stock files and indices from December 1925 —
The files are updated annually.
Bloomberg can perform a Total Return Analysis for a security.
Type the company’s Bloomberg ticker symbol, hit the yellow EQUITY key, type TRA then hit GO.
To compare an equity’s total return against an index,
type the company’s Bloomberg ticker symbol, hit EQUITY, type COMP, then hit GO.
Referencing tips
Business Research Plus 