Corporate Finance Glossar

An income statement reports revenue, costs, expenses and profit or loss over a period, showing how operating activity translated into accounting earnings.

An indicative offer states a buyer's preliminary value, structure, assumptions and approval conditions so a seller can decide whether that buyer should advance.

An information memorandum, often called an IM or CIM in M&A, is a confidential document that gives qualified buyers or investors the information they need to evaluate a business, including its operations, financials, market position, growth plan, risks, and transaction context.

Information rights are legal or contractual entitlements allowing specified investors, lenders or other parties to receive defined information under stated conditions.

An Initial Public Offering (IPO) is the process by which a private company offers shares of its stock to the public for the first time. This transition allows the company to raise capital from public investors, thereby increasing its funding base for expansion and other corporate purposes. An IPO involves various steps, including regulatory filings, underwriting by investment banks, and setting an initial share price.

An integration plan assigns the decisions, owners, timing, resources and controls required to combine organizations while protecting operations and transaction value.

An investment thesis is a testable explanation of how a specific investment can create risk-adjusted value and what evidence would disprove the case.

Investor relations is the controlled practice through which a company communicates performance, strategy, governance and capital matters to authorized shareholders and capital providers.

An investor reporting calendar maps recurring board, shareholder, lender and fund communications to their deadlines, inputs, owners, approvals and recipient groups.

An investor update is a recurring company communication that explains performance, cash, priorities, risks and requests to its authorized shareholders or capital providers.