Helen Katz
Manager
Research & Information Services
Ontario Ministry of Finance

• Business and Management Topics
• People
• Industry Codes
• Companies
• Industries

• Terminology
• Sources

• Dictionaries
• Google – define function (still need to evaluate sources)
Example:
Define: initial public offering

• ABI/Inform Proquest – Dialog, Factiva, Lexis,
Firstsearch
• Business and Management Practices - Dialog
• Business Periodicals Index (Wilson Business
Abstracts) – Firstsearch, Dialog
• Canadian Business and Current Affairs
(CBCA) – Dialog, FPInfomart

9110
9120
9150
9160
9510
9520
9540
Company specific
Product specific
Guidelines
Biographical
Multinational companies
Small business
Nonprofit institutions

• Biographical sources
• Regulatory filings
• News & magazine articles

• Company officers
• Directors

• Company web sites
• Canadian Who’s Who / Who’s Who in Canada
• FP Directory of Directors - FPInfomart
• Standard & Poor’s Register of Corporations,
Directors, and Executives – Dialog, Lexis
• Annual Information Form, Proxy statement
• News articles from business periodicals, national or local newspapers – FPInfomart,
Factiva, Dialog, Lexis

• NAICS – North American Industrial
Classification System http://www.statcan.ca/english/Subjects/St andard/naics/2002/naics02-index.htm
• SIC – Standard Industrial Classification

• Product Codes
• Trade Codes
• International Harmonized Commodity
Description and Coding System (HS) is used for classification of foreign trade

• Public or Private
• Large Companies
• Financial Information
• Regulatory Filings

• Company address
• Officers and directors
• Background/history
• Financial
• Investment/stock
• Corporate families
• Bankers/Accountants/Lawyers

• D & B Canadian Key Business Directory -
Dialog
• D & B Principal International Businesses -
Dialog
• Standard & Poor’s Register of Corporations,
Directors, and Executives – Dialog, Lexis
• ReferenceUSA Canadian Business Data
• Scott’s directories
Specialized directories – by geography or industry

• Private company does not sell securities
(shares) to the public
• Federal or provincial registration
• Federal Corporations Data Online
• http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/cgi-bin/sc_mrksv/ corpdir/ dataOnline/search.cgi?lang=e
• Public company sells securities to the public
• Has greater disclosure responsibilities

• 2,228,572 Canadian companies (June
2003 Business Register)
• 24,052 companies with 100 or over employees
• About 1,400 companies listed on TSX
• Over 2,000 companies listed on TSX
Venture Exchange

• Financial Post 500
• Canadian Business Investor 500
• ROB Top 1000 (Globe & Mail)

• Full year of operation
• Date to end the year is set for financial purposes
• Often December 31
• for retail – January 31 (or 52 weeks ending early January)

Six components:
Auditor’s Report
Earnings Statement
Balance Sheet
Retained Earnings
Statement of Changes in Financial Position
Notes to Financial Statements

• Generally Accepted Accounting
Principles (GAAP)
• U.S., Canadian, International
• Opinion of auditor

• Income Statement, Statement of Revenue &
Expense, Profit Statement, Results of
Operations
• Operating Income – earned from operations of company
• Other Income – investment income
• Money earned & spent over the course of the fiscal year

Revenue from Sale of Goods
Expenses incurred from Sale of Goods
Operating Income
Non-operating Income
Income before Taxes
Income Taxes
Net Income

Three parts:
Assets
Liabilities
Shareholders’ Equity
Snapshot at the end of the fiscal year

What is owned by a company
• Cash & investments
• Inventories
• Property (land & buildings)
• Equipment
What is owing to the company
• Accounts receivable

What a company owes
• Payments
• Loans
• Bonds
Definition of Current Assets and Current
Liabilities

• Shareholders’ ownership or investment in company
• Capital stock
• Earnings retained (Cumulative retained profit)
Difference between value of capital stock and market capitalization

• Link between Earnings Statement &
Balance Sheet
• Cumulative profit
• Also known as Consolidated Statement of Shareholders’ Investment

Retained Earnings, Beginning of Period
Net Earnings for the Period
Dividends Declared
Retained Earnings, End of Period

• Cash flow statement
• Shows how cash is generated & spent
• Certain items are on financial statement as a cost, but there is no money spent

Operations
Investment
Financing
Increase (Decrease) in Cash
Cash, at Beginning of Period
Cash, at End of Period

• Integral part of financial statements
• Explanation and details of information found in financial statements
Guides to Reading Financial Statements
(note that these are all pre-Sarbanes-Oxley) www.prars.com/ibm/ibmframe.html
http://instruction.bus.wisc.edu/corecourses/..
%5Cmcarpenter/readings/financereport.pdf

• Management Discussion & Analysis
• Auditor’s Report
• Financial Statements
• Notes to Financial Statements
• 10 Year Summary (usually)
• Promotional/additional material in annual report

• Unaudited financial statements
• Comparison to previous quarter and to same quarter previous year
• Interim management discussion & analysis
• Proforma financial statements
• EBITDA (Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization)

• Announcement of annual general meeting
• Selection of board of directors, auditors
• Provides details of executive compensation
• Lists major shareholders (over 5% in U.S.; over 10% in Canada)

• Rules and regulations for directors and officers of companies regarding the sale or purchase of company stock

• Prompt disclosure of material information
• Definition of material
• Sarbanes-Oxley Legislation (U.S.)
• Executive certification of disclosure
• Shortening of reporting deadlines
• Impact on Canadian rules
• Fair Disclosure (FD) regulation (U.S.)
• Impact on Canadian regulation

• Annual Report
• Management Discussion & Analysis
• Annual Financial Statement
• Quarterly Report
• Management Information Circular
(Proxy)
• Annual Information Form

• Mathematical function representing relationship of one number to another
• Used to evaluate company financial statements

Types of ratios:
• Liquidity
• Profitability
• Efficiency
• Debt
• Value

• Measures how well a company can deal with its debt obligations
• Examples:
• Debt/Equity Ratio
• Interest Coverage Ratio

Debt/Equity Ratio
• Measures debt outstanding to the monies invested in & earned by the company
• Leverage ratio - the extent to which the company is financed by debt
Interest Coverage
• Measures how much the company earns in relation to the interest it must pay

• Measures the worth to investors of a company’s shares or the return on owning them
• Examples:
• Earnings per Share
• Price-Earnings Ratio (PE Ratio)

Earnings per Share
• profit per share
Price-Earnings Ratio
• comparison of market price to EPS
• higher P/E ratio normally means company is viewed more favourably by investors

• www.sedar.com
• FP Historical Reports, Investor Reports,
Analyzer (FPInfomart)
• Corporate Retriever (Canadian) –
Micromedia ProQuest

• Press release
• Wire service
• Daily news
• Newsletter
• Weekly
• Monthly
Ojala, Marydee. (1996). “The life cyle of business information.” Database , June/July, p. 79-81.

• Government Statistics
• Associations
• Investment Sources
• News and Magazine Articles

1.
Government sources - be creative
• Statistics Canada, Strategis, Natural Resources
2.
Industry overviews in trade journals
3 .Trade associations
4 .Specialized reports on the industry (either ongoing or special)
5 .Articles in the press or in periodicals
(databases)
6 .Consultants, accounting firms
7 .Competitors
8 .Experts

• Specificity of data
• that is, is the data available at the detail you need
• Currency of source
• Currency of data

• Mergent Industry Reports (include Canada)
• Standard and Poor’s Industry Reports
• Business & Industry database – Dialog
• Tablebase (database) – Dialog
• Investext – Dialog, Lexis
• Gale Group PROMT – Dialog
• Gale Group Trade & Industry - Dialog

Performance Plus
• Uses Small Business Profiles from
Statistics Canada
• Most current data is from 2000 http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/epic/internet/inpp
-pp.nsf/en/Home

Weaver, Maggie. (2001). The Canadian B2B
Research Sourcebook: Your Essential
Guide . Ottawa: Canadian Library
Association.
Encyclopedia of Business Information
Resources.
Farmington Hills, MI: Gale
Group. Annual.
Moss, Rita W. (2004). Strauss’s Handbook of
Business Information: A Guide for
Librarians, Students and Researchers .
2 nd ed. Westport, CT.: Libraries Unlimited.

Helen Katz
Manager
Research and Information Services
Ontario Ministry of Finance
Helen.katz@fin.gov.on.ca