How much has executive compensation gone up or down? The DEF 14A is a notice that companies send to stockholders allowing them to vote at the annual meeting that gives them information about shareholder proposals, the board of directors and executives. The S-1 is often the first time that a private company widely discloses its financial performance. The offering price of the stock and how much higher or lower it is compared to the book value of the company.ĭoes the company plan to offer a dividend to its investors? The more prominent the firms, the more likely the stock will sell. Largest shareholders and whether they are selling stock. What the company will do with the money raised from the initial public offering. The Form F-1 is used by private foreign companies seeking to go public.įinancial performance of the company in recent years. This is also known as the registration statement. The Form S-1 is a document filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission by a private company that wants to go public. Many times this disclosure is done through an 8-K. Regulation Fair Disclosure is an SEC law that requires companies to disclose information about its performance to all interested individuals - shareholders, analysts, employees, etc. It must be filed within four business days of the event.īuying or selling a division or another company.Ĭhange in control, such as departure of executives or board members. The Form 8-K report of unscheduled material events or corporate changes that could be of importance to the shareholders or the SEC. What to look for: The same things that you are looking for in a 10-Q. The report must be filed within 60 to 75 days of the end of the company's fiscal year. It provides a comprehensive overview of its business. The Form 10-K is the annual report companies file with the SEC. A company that has recently bought another company may update its shareholders in the filing and tell them whether the deal has actually resulted in the cost savings it promised. A company may disclose that it's about to spend $200 million to upgrade its computer system, and that the cost will lower its earnings. Has the company recently encountered any lawsuits, and has it set aside any money in case it loses the case? A bullish or bearish review can sometimes be parsed from this section.Ĭurrent litigation. A review of what the company thinks of its recent performance. Has the company increased or decreased how much of its own stock it's buying? This could be a sign of what the company thinks about its future prospects. The report must be filed for each of the first three quarters of the fiscal year and is due within 40 days of the close of the quarter. It includes unaudited financial statements and provides a view of its financial position for the previous three months. The Form 10-Q is a report filed quarterly by companies. If you want to be a business journalist, then here's the six SEC filings that most often have news in them, and what you should be looking for in terms of the news that they might contain. Most are filed with the same boilerplate verbiage that you see in a basic contract. And few of these filings have actual news in them anyway. Millions of these documents get filed every year, however, so it's impossible to read every one. With thousands of publicly traded companies in the United States filing documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission - and thousands more private companies doing the same due to bond issues and a large number of shareholders - knowing how to read an SEC filing is an important tool for anyone looking to report about companies. MaHow to use SEC filings to cover companiesīy Chris Roush, The Journalist's Resource March 17, 2011 How to use SEC filings to cover companiesīy Chris Roush, The Journalist's Resource
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