My Favourite Tipples from an Investigative Researcher
Jinfo Blog

By Penny Crossland

Abstract

My Favourite Tipples are shared by Penny Crossland, director of CH Business Research Ltd, an investigative research consultancy specialising in pre-transactional due diligence, individual and company profiles and Know Your Customer and trace reports.

Item

As an investigative researcher I am always on the look out for global data covering companies, individuals and news sources, and preferably on sites that do not require an expensive subscription. I find the resources I've selected invaluable "first ports of call" when I'm starting my research projects.

• OpenCorporates: The remit of this site is to make corporate data more accessible and transparent. OpenCorporates provides basic information on around 85 million companies and its directors in more than 105 jurisdictions, with links to company registry data, where available. It is by no means comprehensive, Swiss and German companies are missing, for example, but you can search for companies in many offshore jurisdictions, such as Cyprus, Liechtenstein and Panama.

• Investigative Resource Center: Put together by US-based investigative consultancy IRI, this site contains links to global open sources, searchable by category and region. Here you can find links to corporate and court records, government sites and national newspapers. I find IRC particularly useful for finding newspaper and media sites that are not covered by the big commercial databases.

• KYC360: A long-time favourite of mine, KYC360 is primarily a forum for Anti-Money Laundering and compliance specialists. I use it for the risk screen service on individuals and companies, which trawls the web, including the so-called hidden web for adverse and general news on subjects. RiskScreen also provides a sanctions and political search to enable searchers to assess entities for risks. A country factbook provides country profiles and key risk indicators.

• 4-Traders: This is an international financial website, providing information on listed companies, indices, markets and currencies worldwide. I use it for company information and particularly like the section on business leaders, which contains a summary of career, current positions and since when held, and - most importantly - shareholdings, albeit in listed companies only.

For fun:

• Freecycle: Living in a typical old suburban London home with limited storage space, I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time sorting out unwanted items, such as clothes, bric-a-brac, toys and kitchen equipment. Rather than send these items to landfill I list them on my local Freecycle site. The concept is simple: you list items you are looking for or are donating in your area. Interested members contact you and pick up the items from your home. It's a win-win, since everybody is grateful, for either finding things they need or for getting rid of things they don't.

An article in FreePint I found particularly interesting:

• I found Colin Smith's article "Insider Knowledge - Researching China" particularly useful. I am increasingly asked to research companies and markets in China and am keen to learn as much as possible about sources in this country and the wider Asia region.

Contribute Your "My Favourite Tipples"

Would you like to share your "My Favourite Tipples" with the FreePint audience? For contributor guidelines email catherine.dhanjal@freepint.com or visit the Publish with FreePint page.

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