I’ve worked for a big buyside equity investor where no expense was spared on getting data, broker reports, etc. Now, I do some equity research for my own account and I’m finding it incredibly frustrating! I don’t have access to Bloomberg, Datastream, or any other paid sources of data let alone broker reports on companies or industries, which are mostly useful for their factual components and getting you up to speed with the the shape of the industry. The bottom line is it’s hard to get hard and useful data on the industry and the business you are looking at. Any retail investors out there with useful advice?
Do you have access to the online databases that your university subscribes to? I know that as an alumni of Hacksaw State Junior College, I’m still able to access everything that we subscribed to, which included everything that any college in the state system used. We had access to some research reports, some crap from value line, a database that collects hundreds of regional business journals, and a decent collection of business profiles, industry reports, etc. It’s not great, but if you have access through your university, it’s free and usually pretty easily searchable.
Morningstar has some limited options for free without a subscription.
Morningstar, Value Line or CapIQ if you have a big budget based on the size of your account.
Fidelity has S&P ER primer reports. They are decent quality and cover the important metrics for said sub-industry
Does your local library give you access to free investment research reports?
I have joined my local library and they give me free access to the Morningstar Investment Research Center (http://library.morningstar.com/) which has reports on most funds, companies and portfolio mgmt tools. For more, I use my broker’s research services.
You can also use followin sites for various data:
-
Finviz
-
InsiderCow
-
TradingEconomics.com (most useful:http://www.tradingeconomics.com/calendar?g=america)
My university has an alumni program where you make a $50 donation and you can access all the univerity library services and they have 15 bloomberg terminals.
FWIW, a new CapIQ seat if you bundle with an existing client is $10.2K for a full year. That’s too much for your average retail user (and most wouldn’t know how to use it anyway) but potentially affordable depending on your needs and size of account. I think they normally run around $18K so I was happy to see it come in lower if you can find a friend with an existing account and bundle it under the same corporate umbrella.
This too drives me nuts. I’ve always had a Bloomberg terminal, and without one feel naked. Sure not going to pay $25K for a terminal though, just not in the budget.
Just signed up for an Interactive Broker’s account for trading, but all the data is extra. So going to have to figure out what I actually need, and pay. Guess I’m spoiled.
Thomson Reuters Eikon Core is a new product that has more than enough information for most retail needs. 350/month.
Get Zacks Data via Quandl
I am thrilled to officially announce that Zacks Research , the authority on analyst estimates in North America, is now offering 5 (and counting) databases on Quandl.
As a registered user you have free preview access to all of them which means you can start using the data right now.
I also want to mention that Zacks is on board with our speculative developer program, meaning individual devs and start-ups can get re-distribution rights to the data at a ridiculously low price.
The same data that powers Bloomberg, CapitalIQ, Morningstar, the Wall Street Journal, Nasdaq, USA Today, ShareBuilder, AOL and MSN is now at your disposal here on Quandl:
- Earnings Estimates: The definitive source of forward-looking consensus forecasts, updated daily for over 5,000 companies.
- Earnings Surprises: Estimated and actual historical earnings for 6,000 companies over the last 12 quarters. The ideal source for back-testing and analysis of how markets react to earnings surprises.
- Earnings Announcements: Forward-looking predictions for earnings announcement dates, estimation parameters, and supplemental data like EPS estimates and actuals.
- Sales Estimates: The analog of the earnings estimates database, for sales and revenue estimates.
- Dividend Data: Extensive dividend history and future announcement dates; this is data that’s extremely hard to get, especially via API.
Each of these databases covers over 5,000 publicly traded US and Canadian companies, and is updated daily. Estimates and forecasts are based on Zacks’ surveys of over 2,600 analysts from 185 brokerage and research firms. Together, these databases represent the world’s best data on company earnings, sales, dividends and forecasts.
We have another 5 exciting new databases lined up for release this month, covering stock fundamentals, EOD stock data, government yields and more. Visit our vendors page to see all our current and forthcoming premium databases!
As usual, your comments and suggestions are appreciated. Have a great weekend.
Best regards, Tammer Kamel** CEO**