If you are researching transactional law, you'll have to develop a research stragegy to include locating information on a business, finding market data, and if it is a public company, you might want to chart the company's stock performance, and locate biographical information on executives and board members. You may also want to research the filing requirements of the Federal Securities & Exchange Commission, or locate a state agency's filing requirements.
Databases & resources available to you for business and finance research are located at both the Law Library and the Business Library.
At the Business Library, you can browse the Business Database Research Guide, an alpha and topical guide to business, finance, marketing and industry resource, see, https://www.library.wisc.edu/business/research-help/business-databases/
If you are looking for an brief overview or profile on a company try:
Data Axle Reference Solutions - Formally ReferenceUSA, this resource has information on millions of companies across the country. If the company you are doing research on is a private company, this is a good place to begin.
Law Library
All three major legal databases available at the law library have transactional law resources and each database has exclusive features, as well as the usual business resources, including: company profiles, SEC filings, checklists, forms, sample clauses & precedent searching, case law, state and federal statutes, regulations, agency decisions and no-action letters.
These legal database are available by subscription to the law school community, and are located in alphabetical order on our Top Law Databases tab, at https://library.law.wisc.edu/top-law-databases/.
Bloomberg Law - To begin your search, select the tab at the top of the screen called, Transactional Intelligence Center, to locate business and securities information. Alternatively, you can select Browse on the top left-hand side of the home page to select a subject from the pop-up menu, "corporate" or "corporate governance" are good places to search for a company profile. The profile will automatically subdivided to links to SEC filings, board member biographies, and so forth. Included in the profile, an AI generate visual graph of legal information on your company.
To begin, type the company name or ticker symbol in the menu box to retrieve a company profile.
Lexis for law schools - At the tab at the top of the screen, select Practice Areas: Select Business Entities, Corporate & M&A or Capital Markets & Corporate Governance for topical resources, includes checklists, sample agreements and market trends.
If you would like to review a D&B report, Lexis+ includes: Dun & Bradstreet Global Market Identifiers Plus
Westlaw for law schools - To locate company information on Westlaw, select the Practice Area tab and then select your subtopic, corporations, corporate governance, M&A, and so forth.
If you are beginning your research and would like to search a legal encyclopedia on corporate law, Westlaw provides a favorite: Fletchers Cyclopedia of the Law of Corporations.
For Securities research, try Westlaw's Business Law Center. This database has SEC filings, EDGAR and SEDAR precendent agreements, a forms guide, and other related securities law resources.
Submitted by Jenny Zook, Reference Librarian on February 1, 2022
This article appears in the categories: Law Library
