How to Use Annual Report

Home
>
Investing
>
How to Use Annual Report

How to Use Annual Report

There are many steps in calculating the fair value of a company. However, before we even do that, it is imperative to know how a company earns its profit. Does it do that by selling to consumers? licensing its technology to other companies? or extracting natural resources from the ground?

The sensible way to do it is by reading the company's annual report. What is an annual report? Annual report is yearly publication by public companies to better inform investor about the company's line of business. Annual report gives investors a glance of the company's line of business, financial health as well as management's strategies for doing business.

Let's look at CNET Networks Inc. The company trades in the NASDAQ market with symbol: CNET. What does CNET do? I know CNET owns cnet.com. But do you know that it also owns download.com, MP3.com, ZDnet.com and News.com ? How do I know that? Yep, you guess it. CNET's Annual Report will gives you all that.

From CNET's annual report, we can do a little digging for CNET's internet traffic. As of August 27th 2005, these websites of CNET attracts 3 % of all internet traffic. Pretty impressive, considering that Google holds 23% of all internet traffic. On April 2005, Google had 78.6 million unique visitors. By comparing this metric, we might have an idea CNET's revenue potential for the month of August. I will not go into that but this shows how useful reading CNET's annual report is. Reading an annual report serves as the first step towards investing in a particular company.

How do we obtain annual report? There are several sources for this. First is the companies own website. You are interested in knowing more about CNET Networks? You can get the annual report by going to http://www.cnet.com and go to its shareholder relation. After several clicks, you can then download the annual report.

Or ... you can go to some websites that offer complete annual report for a number of different companies in alphabetical order. Our website is one of them. Admittedly, while having hundreds of annual reports in one place is convenient, it is not as thorough as what the company's own website has to say.

Hari Wibowo manages a small finance website aiming to help new investors getting started. Curious? You can find his other writings at http://www.noviceinvesting.com

In The News:

msnbc.com (blog)
Facebook's bungled IPO ticks off small investors
msnbc.com (blog)
“I was caught up in the excitement of an enormous social media company going public and thought that over the long run, the investment would be profitable,” she said. “It's a service I use several times a day, and that's how I like to invest -- in ...
Facebook: A lesson in IPO investingFirst Coast News
Individual Investors Deserve To Be Burned By FacebookSeeking Alpha
Facebook could face huge damage claims from IPOPasadena Star-News
PolicyMic -BusinessWeek -MarketWatch
all 5,116 news articles »

Invest in India? Patience will pay off
CNNMoney
By Ali Velshi @Money May 25, 2012: 5:09 AM ET The challenges and investing opportunities presented by India -- a country of 1.2 billion people -- are vast indeed. (MONEY Magazine) -- My great-grandfather left his little village in India more than a ...

and more »

U.S. News & World Report (blog)
Investing in Alternatives
U.S. News & World Report (blog)
By Tim MicKey The adviser community has a better understanding of the potential advantages of adding alternative investments to client portfolios as a way of diversifying and, hopefully, further managing risk in client accounts.
11 Ways to Help Yourself Stay Sane in a Crazy MarketPatch.com
Saving needs to become a disciplined habitMontgomery Advertiser

all 3 news articles »

Stanford Investment Group, Inc. Hosted Presentation "Your True Legacy: It's ...
San Francisco Chronicle (press release)
Stanford Investment Group, Inc. hosted a presentation discussing the differences between men and women as it relates to money and investing. Mountain View, CA (PRWEB) May 24, 2012 As part of Stanford Investment Group, Inc.'s mission statement to engage ...

and more »

Advisor.ca
REPEAT: BMO InvestorLine Addresses Four Online Investing Myths
MarketWatch (press release)
However, as widespread and convenient as online investing has become, a few myths still persist. "Despite the increasing popularity of online investing, a few misconceptions about the platform remain," said Cesar Rainusso, Vice President, ...
Online investing popular, but myths persistAdvisor.ca

all 14 news articles »

ThinkProgress
Goldman Sachs Investing $40 Billion More in Clean Energy
CleanTechnica
Not even a couple weeks ago, Mridul wrote that Goldman Sachs–backed firm ReNew Power Limited was investing Rs 6000 crore (over $1.1 billion) to build 1 GW (1000 MW) of wind power projects across India. Apparently, Goldman Sachs has much bigger plans ...
Goldman Sachs To Invest $40 Billion In Clean Energy: 'The Underlying Thesis ...ThinkProgress
Goldman plans $40-billion in clean energy investments over next decadeNational Post

all 52 news articles »

The Thin Line of Stock Investing
PR Newswire (press release)
CHICAGO, May 25, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Zacks Investment Research presents their newest list of stocks featured in their weekly Research Wizard article, which describes how to profit from stock market opportunities. The ideas in this article focus on the ...

and more »

USA TODAY
What should investors do with a windfall?
USA TODAY
By John Waggoner Investing You're probably used to reading newspaper advice about what to do in terrible financial situations, like what to do when your wallet's on fire, or how to pay for bail from a Turkish prison. By John Waggoner But sometimes, ...

and more »

Analysis: Funds of hedge funds fight to stay relevant
Chicago Tribune
Massachusetts' $48 billion state pension fund for instance recently completed a $500 million direct investing program, moving to cut its reliance on funds of funds. Meanwhile, in Europe, pension funds for companies such as ABB, Nestle and Novartis are ...

and more »

Interested in JDS Uniphase? Wait until the 2H/2012 to Invest
msnbc.com
But it is having problems attracting interested investors right now because it is a victim of a poor macro economy. Its clients just are not interested in spending right now. So what should a long term investor do if he/she is interested in looking at ...

Google News