Support for StockCentral

General

What is StockCentral?

StockCentral is an online community for individual investors and investment clubs. StockCentral offers members a financial data service, web-based analysis tools, message boards, educational workshops, and discounts on ICLUBcentral software and services.

How do I change my StockCentral password and/or Account Information?

If you lost your password, click the Forgot Username/Password? link on the login page. If you wish to change your password or other account information, Just click on the "My Account" link in the upper right of the screen after logging in, and then follow the appropriate link. You can also change other information about yourself.

Who makes StockCentral?

StockCentral is developed, owned, and operated by ICLUBcentral Inc., a for-profit subsidiary of BetterInvesting. We've been making software and tools for individual investors and investment clubs since 1989. Our "World Headquarters" is in Troy, MI.

Data

How current is the data?

The StockCentral datafiles are generated each night. Quarterly and annual data is updated as soon as is possible after the company files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, on Form 8-K (generally when the company issues a press release announcing quarterly or annual results), Form 10-Q, or Form 10-K. In the case of data extracted from Form 8-K, the data delivered via the service is considered "preliminary." Upon release of final data in Form 10-Q or Form 10-K, this preliminary data would be overwritten with final results.

Is the StockCentral data service normalized?

We prefer to use fully-diluted, normalized Earnings Per Share from a company's ongoing operations in our stock studies. This provides a view of the company's ability to generate organic growth without the impact of non-recurring items. This figure typically includes income from continuing operations, less any extraordinary gains/losses or other non-continuing special income or charges, and is calculated using diluted common shares outstanding (adjusted for the assumed conversion of all potentially dilutive securities, which may include convertible debentures, warrants, options, convertible preferred stock, etc.)

What are the sectors and industry groups used in the data service?

Morningstar classifies companies into eleven sectors: Basic Materials, Consumer Cyclicals, Financial Services, Real Estate, Consumer Defensive, Healthcare, Utilities, Communication Services, Energy, Industrials, and Technology. StockCentral subscribers can view key averages for each sector and their component industry groups in our awesome Sector and Industry Average Browser.

Are the annual high and low prices for a company's fiscal year or calendar year?

The annual high and low prices in our data are for a company's fiscal year. They use the intraday high and low prices.

How are revenues calculated for banks?

Bank revenues are calculated as follows:
Net Interest Income + Non-interest Income - Loan Loss Provisions = Revenue
This is the preferred method of calculating bank revenue.

Does the data include analysts' estimates?

Yes, the data currently includes analyst consensus estimates (ACE) of long-term EPS growth.

What are the differences in data available from Value Line, BI's Stock Data, and StockCentral?

Our data service provides up to ten years of historical fundamental and price data for more than 7,000 publicly-traded U.S. companies. The data is used by all of our online tools and comes from Morningstar, Inc.

Value Line

• Cannot be imported into the software automatically, can only be entered by hand or pulled from site.
• Tracks about 1,500 companies in its main publication; companies are chosen based on Value Line criteria. Other companies are included in less detail in supplementary subscriptions.
• Only counts operating Income. For example, selling old or defunct hardware is not considered regular income, and thus is not counted.
• Each tracked company has a written analysis of the business, including numerical ratings for Timeliness, Safety, and Technical as well as estimates for the next five years. Each group is performed by a different analyst, which may lead to different data normalization.
• Data for a company is updated every thirteen weeks regardless of the timing of quarterly data being released.

BI's Stock Data

• Data comes from Morningstar, Inc.
• Tracks all companies on the NYSE, AMEX, NASDAQ, Toronto Venture and Toronto Stock Exchanges.
• Tracked companies are not rated, judged or analyzed in any way.
• Data is updated every day.

StockCentral Data

• Data comes from Morningstar, Inc.
• Tracks all companies on the NYSE, AMEX, NASDAQ, Toronto Venture and Toronto Stock Exchanges.
• Tracked companies are not rated, judged, or analyzed in any way.
• Data is updated every day.
• Includes proprietary Take Stock Quality Index and long-term growth rates.
• Includes automatic Roster of Quality delivery into Toolkit 6.

Why do institutional and insider ownership percentages sometimes add up to more than 100%?

An institution that owns more than 5% of a company’s stock is also classified as an insider and would be included in both the totals of institutional and insider ownership.

How is free cash flow per share calculated in the data service?

Free Cash Flow removes any capital expenditures from the calculations and is preferred by many investors when evaluating a company's financial statements. Here are Morningstar's definitions of the underlying data points in the calculation of Free Cash Flow:
Free Cash Flow = Operating Cash Flow - Capital Expenditures

Operating Cash Flow: The net cash from (used in) all of the entity's operating activities, including those of discontinued operations, of the reporting entity. Operating activities include all transactions and events that are not defined as investing or financing activities. Operating activities generally involve producing and delivering goods and providing services. Cash flows from operating activities are generally the cash effects of transactions and other events that enter into the determination of net income.

Capital Expenditures: Funds used by a company to acquire or upgrade physical assets such as property, industrial buildings or equipment. This type of outlay is made by companies to maintain or increase the scope of their operations. Capital expenditures are generally depreciated or depleted over their useful life, as distinguished from repairs, which are subtracted from the income of the current year.

The data service includes free cash flow per share for each year of historical data available.

Using StockCentral Data with Our Windows-based Desktop Software

How do I configure Toolkit 6 to use StockCentral data?

Follow these instructions to configure Toolkit 6 to use StockCentral's company data service:

1. OpenToolkit 6.
2. Select Options > Preferences from the menu.
3. Click the Data Feed tab.
4. Enter your StockCentral login and password (not your email address).
5. Under "Data Feed," click the option for StockCentral.
6. Click OK.

Now, enter a ticker symbol in the Ticker box in the main Toolkit toolbar and you can download SSG data from StockCentral.com.

Why do I get an error in Toolkit when I download stock data from StockCentral?

There are three possible explanations for why you receive an error message when downloading data into Toolkit:

1. Your StockCentral subscription is expired.
2. The computer is not connected to the Internet.
3. The StockCentral username and password is not entered, incorrect, or simply not selected.
4. There is a firewall blocking the connection.

Solutions:

1. Renew your StockCentral subscription.
2. If the computer is not connected to the Internet, you can not get Internet updates to the software or data from StockCentral. Please confirm that you are on the Internet by going to a new web site, then getting your data again.
3. To check your StockCentral username and password in Toolkit:
   1. Go to Options > Preferences > Data Feed.
   2. Enter your StockCentral login and password again, just in case there was a typo. Remember, enter your login name, not your email address.
   3. Select StockCentral.
4. If you have personal firewall software on your computer, it might be interfering with the connection to the StockCentral database. Please check this by temporarily disabling your firewall. Many firewalls can be configured to accept connections from specific domains, in this case, iclub.com and stockcentral.com.
   

   There are two parts to fixing firewall issues: the quick fix and the permanent solution. For the quick fix, you can disable your firewall temporarily. For the permanent solution, you will need to contact your firewall vendor to permanently allow connections to iclub.com. Tell the vendor, "I have a program that goes to the internet for data and [Norton Internet Security/Zone Alarm/etc.] is blocking it. Please help me set up an exception so it is no longer blocked."