The document
Choose the annual report, quarterly update, or event disclosure before you start reading.
10-K, 10-Q, or 8-K? · Find it on EDGARThe filing library
Understand the filing.
Test the story.
Learn what a company reports, how the numbers fit together, and which questions the filing still leaves open.
Choose a starting point
What are you trying to understand?
The business
Connect management's explanation to margins, segments, and the accounting notes.
Read an annual report · Understand MD&AThe earnings claim
Write down what management said. Find the evidence that could support or contradict it.
Before and after earnings · Narrative vs. numbersThe cash behind the earnings
Separate operating cash, reinvestment, and financing. Keep the periods and definitions aligned.
Use the cash-flow workbench · Avoid cash-flow trapsRead with the source open
The missing line in a simple cash-flow calculation.
Subtracting equipment purchases from operating cash does not reproduce Meta's own free-cash-flow figure. Its definition also deducts finance lease principal.
Work through the 2024 report, find the extra line, and decide what the result does and does not tell you. Then use the same worksheet for another company.
Read the Meta notebookYour next company
Bring a better question to the search.
The reference tool provides dated SEC figures and source documents. Use it to locate evidence, not to substitute an automated label for your own conclusion.