Data Sources

1. Overview

Every number on AlphaStocks originates from public, authoritative data sources. We do not use proprietary data feeds, analyst estimates, or third-party ratings. All scores are deterministic — given the same input data, the same output scores are produced every time. This makes every score fully reproducible and traceable back to its source.

Our data pipeline processes three primary inputs: financial statements from SEC EDGAR, market prices from Alpaca Markets, and company news from Finnhub. Everything else — composite scores, fair value estimates, model signals, labels — is calculated from these inputs using our published methodology.

2. SEC EDGAR (Financial Statements)

The SEC EDGAR (Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval) system is the official repository of corporate filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. All publicly traded companies are required by law to file their financial statements here.

We ingest structured financial data from two filing types:

• 10-K (Annual Reports): Comprehensive annual financial statements including income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement
• 10-Q (Quarterly Reports): Interim quarterly financial data, providing more frequent updates between annual reports

Filings are parsed via the XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) format, which provides machine-readable, standardized financial data. From each filing, we extract:

• Earnings & profitability: Earnings per share (EPS), net income, operating income, revenue, gross margins, operating margins, return on equity (ROE), return on assets (ROA), return on invested capital (ROIC)
• Balance sheet strength: Total assets, total liabilities, shareholders' equity, book value per share, current ratio, debt-to-equity ratio, long-term debt, cash and equivalents
• Cash flow: Operating cash flow, free cash flow, capital expenditures
• Growth metrics: Revenue growth, earnings growth, book value growth (year-over-year and multi-year)
• Sector-specific adjustments: FFO (Funds From Operations) for REITs, adjusted book value for banks, combined ratio for insurers

Update cadence:New filings are processed within 24 hours of appearing on EDGAR. During earnings season (January–February and July–August), dozens of filings may be processed daily.

3. Alpaca Markets (Market Prices)

Alpaca Markets provides real-time and historical stock price data through a regulated brokerage API. Alpaca is a FINRA member and SEC-registered broker-dealer.

From Alpaca, we use:

• Current price:Latest traded price for each S&P 500 stock
• 52-week range: High and low prices over the trailing 12 months, used for price context and range analysis
• 6-month returns: Trailing six-month price change, percentile-ranked within the S&P 500 for the Momentum axis
• Market capitalization: Current share price multiplied by shares outstanding, used for weighting and context
• Historical OHLCV: Open, High, Low, Close, and Volume data for historical analysis and backtesting

Update cadence:Price data is refreshed every 2 hours during U.S. market hours (9:30 AM – 4:00 PM ET, Monday through Friday). Outside market hours, the most recent closing price is displayed. Prices may be delayed by up to 15 minutes.

4. Finnhub (News)

Finnhub provides company-specific news aggregation from major financial news outlets. News articles are matched to individual S&P 500 companies and made available to premium users.

News data is used as supplementary context alongside quantitative scores. It does not directly influence scores or ratings — all scoring is based exclusively on financial statements and market prices.

Update cadence: News is fetched in real-time as articles are published. Available to premium subscribers only.

5. Calculated Metrics

Everything beyond raw financial data and market prices is derived, not sourced from a third party. This includes:

• Five model scores: Piotroski F-Score, Buffett Quality, Graham Fair Value, Lynch PEG Classification, Greenblatt Magic Formula — all computed from SEC EDGAR data
• Four-axis composite score: Quality, Value, Momentum, and Timing — weighted and combined into a single 0–10 score
• Fair value estimates: Sector-specific intrinsic value calculations with confidence gates and EV/EBITDA fallback
• Score labels: “Strong Buy” through “Avoid” — category names mapped to numerical ranges, not analyst opinions
• Percentile rankings: Each stock ranked against all other S&P 500 companies on every metric

We do not use analyst estimates, consensus targets, sentiment scores, or any third-party ratings in our calculations. Every output is traceable to SEC filings and market prices. See our methodology for the complete formula and weights.

6. Update Frequency

7. Coverage

AlphaStocks covers all S&P 500 constituents — approximately 503 companies (the index includes some companies with multiple share classes). Coverage is rebalanced when S&P Dow Jones Indices adds or removes companies from the index.

When a company is added to the S&P 500, we begin scoring it within 24 hours, provided sufficient historical filing data is available on SEC EDGAR. When a company is removed from the index, its historical scores remain accessible but it is no longer included in active rankings or percentile calculations.

8. Limitations

Transparency requires being honest about what our data does not capture:

• Backward-looking only: All data comes from past filings and historical prices. We do not use forward earnings estimates, analyst forecasts, or guidance.
• No qualitative assessment: Management quality, corporate culture, pending litigation, regulatory changes, and competitive dynamics are not captured by any of our data sources.
• Filing delays and restatements: Companies occasionally restate prior filings or file late. Our data reflects the most recently available filing at any given time.
• No real-time events: Breaking news, CEO departures, product recalls, or geopolitical events are not reflected in scores until they appear in a subsequent SEC filing or in the market price.
• U.S. equities only: Coverage is limited to S&P 500 constituents. International stocks, small caps, bonds, ETFs, and other asset classes are not covered.