Company Research (Historical)

Annual Reports

• Canadian Corporate Reports – Index of historical Canadian annual reports held at McGill University. The collection, which traces many companies back to the 19th Century, consists of annual reports of approximately 2,000 Canadian corporations in all business sectors. Housed on the 4^th floor of the McLennan Library building in Rare Books & Special Collections. To view, make a request through our Rare Books department. 
• Canadian Corporate Reports On Microfiche - a complement to our collection of physical annual reports, the microfiche collection contains annual reports of selected Canadian companies during the 1980s and 1990s. 
• Proquest Historical Annual Reports – Annual reports going back to 1844 for over 800 companies (primarily American companies).

Financial Statements

Many financial statements can be found in the annual reports listed above. Try also:

• Mergent Webreports : Contains company financial statements back to 1910 retrievable by broad industry or company. Digitized copy of the Moody’s Industrial Handbook.
• Financial Post– Survey of Industrials – Contains key financial figures for Canadian companies, 1929-1999.
• Financial Post Investment Reports (Yellow Cards):  Financial summaries of Canadian companies going back to the 1960s. Available in print on the fourth floor of the McLennan Library building in Rare Books and Special Collections. See here for a list of companies covered.

Company History

• FP Infomart: Find out when a Canadian company merged, closed or changed names.  
• International Directory of Company Histories: Provides a detailed history of many U.S. and Canadian public companies and some private companies.Historical Business Newspapers

Historical Newspapers

• Financial Times Historical Archive : Covers 1888-2006
• Wall Street Journal (Proquest Historical Newspapers) : Covers 1889- 1993
• The Times Digital Archive (UK):  Covers 1785-1985

Researching Old Stock Certificates

We do NOT research old stock certificates. You can use the above Company History resources to determine if the name changed or if the company is now defunct.

For more information on how to research certificates see:

• CBC – “Researching old stock and bond certificates”
• Ontario Securities Commission - "I have a share certificate. How can I find out if it has any value?"
• Securities & Exchange Commission - "Stock and Bond Certificates, Old"