Business Finance Homework Help

Company: Ocugen,Inc

Step 1:?Go gather the 10-k statement from the most recent annual year of your company. Source: SEC Edgar

?Find the letter to shareholders that management released, preferably most recent, but do what you can. Company investor webpage news releases. Or other

?Take a look at the investors website for your company, just casually. They all are different.

Step 2:?Read the letter to shareholders in entirety, make notes

Remember,  this  is  your  first  step  in  understanding  the  business,  read  it  as  such.  This  is  what  the CEO/management team wants to say about the company. Legally, they cannot lie. There should be some information  on  the  structure  of  the  company,  past/present/&future  business,  capital  structure,  M&A, dividends,  etc.,  and  general  statements  about  the  company  and  its  people.  There  are  incentives  and unique  wording  used  in  most  every  letter  (i.e.  sentiment  is  attempted  to  be  extracted  from  letters,  as well). As an analyst of the company, use this as your first step to understand the business…every letter is different, so: 

– Extract  out  pertinent  financially  stated  information  in  a  bulleted  point  list,  typically  their overarching financial situation/goals/expectations

– Extract out non-financial information that is important to the business (e.g. how they create value or future prospects for growth, etc.)

– Extract out any interesting information otherwise, that either you think is valuable (no need for copy and paste unless there is a perfectly worded line or two, you can ‘quote’ this.

– Extract out a bullet point list of any parts you don’t understand what the management is saying. If you don’t know what an LBO is, for example, and they discuss it without clarifying, please add this to your list of “I do not understands”.

?Read the 10-k statement, take notes. 

– Get the income statement, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows into an excel sheet (yahoo finance or other may help you export one), but double check it in the 10-k.

– Find out what is said or posted about their investments, capital expenditures, etc.

– Find  out  what  is  said  about  their  debt.  Try  to  see  the  characteristics  of  their  debt/bonds/bank loans/etc.?Continue  to  make  notes/bullet  points  on  possibly  important  info  both  quantitatively  and qualitatively.

– Check  the  footnotes,  see  what  is  being  said.  This  is  where  some  information  gets  hidden  and clarifies certain aspects of a 10-k.

– Extract out a bullet point list of any parts you don’t understand what the management is saying to a list of “ 10-k I do not understands”.

The  output  will  probably  be  a  relatively  long  document  with  a  combination  of  small  segments  of  writing,  lots  of  bullet point takeaways, some headings and sub-headings for organization, and should be organized in structure (probably going to be a very ugly document as you begin building, but then you’ll go clean it up at the end to submit). There should be clear  sections  of  information  obtained  from  Letter  and  10-k  for  (it  will  be  smart  for  certain,  non-obvious  items,  to  also make a quick note of where you saw it (i.e.“(letter p.8)”). These are long documents so it’s nice to have a reference point occasionally.After/as you build the above, remember “CTRL F” will be your friend. “CTRL C and V” are not expected to be used much. This is your first knowledge building of the company. Also, hard work is expected, I know this is a big task. Let’s dig deep. If you can’t find something like the letter, start emailing/calling the company asking for the latest one as a future investor.