Worldscope Database Datatype Definitions Guide

Issue 6
Frequently Asked Questions
Field 05350 Date of Fiscal Period End is available for each year, and contains the
month, day and year on which the company's fiscal period ended. Field 05351 Length
of Fiscal Period is also available. Field 05352 Month of Fiscal Period End contains
the month of the most recent completed annual period.
It should be noted that in some cases of fiscal year end change, the transitional fiscal
period provided by companies may be greater than twelve months, and therefore it
may seem as if there is a 'missing year' on Worldscope. An example is a change from
December to March where the annual data released is for December 2003 followed
by March 2005.
Interim data provided will be maintained on the old year end basis until the new year end
is complete. At that time the interim period data for both annual and interim series for the
change year is overwritten to correspond with the new year end.
15. IN WHAT FORMATS IS WORLDSCOPE AVAILABLE?
The database is available directly from Worldscope or via internal or 3rd party
software platforms. Further information on delivery platforms is available on
http://www.thomson.com/financial or by calling our client support desk directly.
16. HOW MUCH HISTORY IS AVAILABLE FOR COMPANIES ON WORLDSCOPE?
The earliest information contained on Worldscope is for 1980. Many North American
companies and larger companies in the other developed markets have history back to
this date. History for most other companies in developed market commences in the
mid 1980s for medium sized and mid 1990s for small sized companies.
Worldscope expanded coverage to include emerging markets in the early 1990s.
Companies and countries have been gradually added since then. Asia-Pacific
coverage increased significantly in 2004 and 2005
For new additions and IPOs, up to 4 years of historical data may be added.
Companies targeted for a full detailed update normally have a minimum of four years
of financial information, with the obvious exceptions of newly created companies or
recent privatisations. Smaller market capitalization coverage for which a summary
data set may be targeted is added with one to two years of data. See FAQ 8 related
to coverage criteria.
17. DOES WORLDSCOPE PROVIDE INFORMATION ON INACTIVE OR DEAD COMPANIES AND
SECURITIES?
Worldscope’s prime aim is to target companies with listed equities. Worldscope
contains extinct or inactive companies, i.e. those which have merged, liquidated or
become privately held. History for these companies remains on the database.
Company data for inactive or dead companies may not be necessarily available on all
delivery platforms.
18. HOW CAN I DETERMINE IF A COMPANY IS INACTIVE?
If data (in the form of a date) is present in Field 07015 Inactive Date (Company) then
the company is inactive as of that date. The reason why the company became
inactive can be found in Footnote N attached to Field 00000 Company Status. This
note contains the standard text "Company inactive:", followed by an explanation, e.g.
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