Frequently Asked Questions
Form 13F is a filing that all institutional investors who manage over $100 million
in assets must submit to the SEC no later than 45 days after the end of the March,
June, September, and December quarters.
The 13F is essentially a list of holdings that large investors own.
Individual activists or "whales" are also required to file Form 13F. These include
successful investors such as Warren Buffett (see
Berkshire Hathaway),
T Boone Pickens (see
BP Capital),
Carl Icahn, and Eddie Lampert (see
RBS Partners).
By comparing
current holdings with previous quarters, one may infer which stocks are
being bought and sold by the "whales".
13F filers aren't required to file until 45 days after the end of the quarter.
If this falls on a weekend then filings are due the following Monday.
While they can obviously file early, most filers tend to wait until
the last minute to submit their filing. Of course there are always
stragglers that don't file for days or even weeks after that.
Any asset that is considered a 13F asset by the SEC must be reported on Form 13F.
The official list can be found at
http://www.sec.gov/divisions/investment/13flists.htm.
Basically anything that is traded on an exchange as well as certain equity options
and warrants, shares of closed-end investment companies and certain
convertible debt securities.
The shares of open-end investment companies
(i.e., mutual funds) are not Section 13(f) securities
Please remember that the import process is not perfect. It is entirely automated
and done in real-time. So within an hour of the SEC releasing a filing,
WhaleWisdom imports and displays it. The risk with providing real-time
access such as this is that the filing may contain mistakes or the import
process incorrectly parses the filing. If you have doubts about the validity
of certain filings then please check with the actual SEC filing. Links are
provided back to every 13F filing used by the site. And if you find an error, please
report it to us so we may correct it for others.
WhaleWisdom checks with the SEC every hour to see if any new 13F filings have
been posted. As soon as any are found they are automatically processed
and released. You can see the latest filings by
clicking here
The database goes back to the March 31, 2001 quarter.
Only the last 9 quarters are available for free to everyone. Please
contact us for pricing information
to gain access to earlier
time periods.
These are to segregate holdings by class. PRN indicates principal amount on convertible debt securities.
If the holdings being reported are put or call options, then the designation
"PUT" or "CALL" is used as appropriate.
Prices used in backtests are the "total returns" price for the end of day.
The total returns price includes dividends, spinoffs, and other adjustments
so it likely won't match the actual closing price for the stock.
Estimated Avg Price uses the stock price at the quarter end date to determine the average price paid.
It also takes into account past quarterly 13F transactions and adjusts with the funds buying/selling over time.
It's just a guesstimate since the fund could have purchased the position at any time during the quarter.
The Heat Map/WhaleIndex/13F statistics pages are not updated until 1-2 days AFTER the 13F filing deadline.
The deadline for 13F's is 45-days after the end of the quarter.
