Libguides: Company Information: Estimates / Forecasts

Estimates - definition

to Estimate is "to guess or calculate the cost,size, value, etc. of something"
(Source: the Cambridge Dictionary

I/B/E/S Estimates

I/B/E/S, the Institutional Brokers' Estimate System,

is a database from Thomson Reuters. It is an historical earnings estimate database containing analyst estimates for more than 20 forecast measures - including EPS (earnings per share), revenue, price targets, EBITDA and pre-tax profits - available on both consensus and detailed levels, covering both U.S. and international companies. The database also includes buy-hold-sell recommendations.
Access: via Datastream you have access to I/B/E/S data. You also find I/B/E/S data via WRDS, but for the moment no CBS access.

Databases with estimates / forecasts

I/B/E/S via Datastream

Content:
I/B/E/S provides current and historical consensus data and forecasts from security analysts, for companies worldwide. Forecast items include earnings per share, revenue, cash flow, long-term growth projections, and stock recommendations. Data are available in multiple frequencies as well as covering shorter or longer time frames.
Datastream holds the Historical and Current Summary databases from I/B/E/S. These databases primarily provide earnings forecasting data.

Coverage:
over 60.000+ US Companies (beginning in 1976) and International Companies (beginning in 1987)

Search IBES data by Excel add-inn > Times Series:

Find the securities / companies by Time Series Request > Find Series
Find the IBES data by Datatypes > IBES
by ticking on the datatypes in the buttom you a get pop-up description of the chosen datatype

Search IBES data by templates:

Choose Datastream > Templates > Excel Template Library > Estimates

In this example the Earnings Historical Estimates is chosen

Bloomberg

Bloomberg has forecast data for over 17000 companies worldwide. You can use functions like

Estimates Consensus Detail (EEB), to displays aggregated broker-contributed projections for a selected equity
The function Earnings and Estimates (EE) provides a snapshot of aggregated broker earnings projections, surprise earnings data, and a summary of earnings history.
The function Earning Trends (EM) provides comprehensive earnings trends analysis

These functions work well for individual firms. If you have lists of firms, then use the Bloomberg Spreadsheet builder in Excel

Eikon

How to find Estimates:
Type estimates in the Search box on the top left of the application and select the relevant OR open the Estimates tab of a Company page and select an estimates report

Select ready-made Estiamtes templates from the Excel Template Library

I/B/E/S via WRDS (CBS has no access)

I/B/E/S, the Institutional Brokers' Estimate System, is a database from Thomson Reuters. It is an historical earnings estimate database containing analyst estimates for more than 20 forecast measures - including EPS (earnings per share), revenue, price targets, EBITDA and pre-tax profits - available on both consensus and detailed levels, covering both U.S. and international companies. The database also includes buy-hold-sell recommendations.

I/B/E/S History is a comprehensive expectation database and is ideal for research and back-testing of investment theories and proprietary models.

I/B/E/S Guidance is a related, but separate, product from Thomson Reuters that includes management's predictions about their own company (as opposed to the opinions of 3rd party analysts). It includes information previously available in the Company Issued Guidance (CIG) file in base I/B/E/S and information from the defunct First Call database.

I/B/E/S Global Aggregates is another add-on product that provides earnings forecasts for countries and major international indices.

Coverage:
I/B/E/S has forecast information on 60,000 companies across 100+ markets.