Ask HN: Where do magic numbers come from on SEC statements

1 point

3 years ago

I'm trying to figure out where numbers reported (or not reported) on financial statements come from.

For instance, Amazon stopped reporting "Property, Plant and Equipment - Net" in 2020, I believe.

Yet, for the latest 10-K (annual report in 2022) you can find the number on CNBC (https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/AMZN?tab=financials), though it's a different number than appears on macrotrends.net (https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/AMZN/amazon/balance-sheet).

This is just one of many "magic" numbers.

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I'm trying to source some data from some APIs and using CNBC as my source of truth, that I compare data to that I'm getting from some APIs.

I find it hard to believe that if it's not in the SEC filing, that someone didn't just make up some number: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1018724/000101872423000004/amzn-20221231.htm