Stock Metric Lab publishes educational content about companies, financial statements, valuation, and investment research. This policy explains how we select sources, verify calculations, use artificial intelligence, manage conflicts of interest, update articles, and correct errors.
Our goal is to make analytical reasoning visible and reproducible. We do not promise that every estimate will prove correct, and we do not present educational research as personalized investment advice.
Written and reviewed by: Shingo Harada — Founder and Author, Stock Metric Lab
Last reviewed: September 14, 2026
Editorial principles
We aim for content that is:
- Accurate: factual claims and calculations should be supported by appropriate evidence.
- Transparent: definitions, assumptions, data dates, and material limitations should be disclosed.
- Independent: conclusions should not be changed to satisfy an issuer, advertiser, data provider, or other interested party.
- Useful: articles should connect formulas and reported figures to an understandable analytical question.
- Proportionate: the strength of a conclusion should reflect the quality and completeness of the available evidence.
- Correctable: readers should have a clear way to report possible errors.
Scope of our content
Stock Metric Lab may publish company research, financial-metric explainers, valuation frameworks, comparisons, checklists, and related investment education. Company-specific articles may discuss scenarios, risks, and valuation inputs, but they are not recommendations to buy, sell, or hold a security.
We distinguish among:
- Reported facts, drawn from identified sources.
- Calculated figures, derived from disclosed inputs and formulas.
- Estimates, which depend on assumptions about future or normalized conditions.
- Editorial judgments, which interpret evidence and may reasonably differ among analysts.
Where practical, articles label these categories through wording, tables, source notes, or methodology explanations.
Research and editorial process
Our standard workflow is:
- Define the question the article is intended to answer.
- Gather relevant primary documents and record their reporting dates.
- Reconcile important figures to the source documents.
- Calculate or reproduce material ratios and examples.
- Review assumptions, industry limitations, counterarguments, and uncertainty.
- Check citations, internal links, formulas, tables, and prominent factual claims.
- Add an educational disclaimer and review information before publication.
- Revisit the article when new information materially affects its usefulness or accuracy.
The depth of review varies with the content. A timeless definition may require fewer updates than a company analysis containing current financial data or market prices.
Source standards
Primary sources first
We prefer original and authoritative sources whenever they are reasonably available, including:
- Regulatory filings and official issuer reports.
- Audited financial statements and accompanying notes.
- Official investor-relations releases and presentations.
- Accounting standards, regulator guidance, and government publications.
- Original academic papers, textbooks, and methodology pages from identified experts.
Secondary sources may help provide context, discover issues, or compare interpretations. They should not replace an available primary source for a material company fact. Market-data platforms and screeners are useful starting points, but important figures should be checked against the relevant filing or issuer disclosure when practicable.
Dates and changing information
Financial data changes as companies report results, restate figures, complete transactions, or update guidance. Market prices can change continuously. Company-specific content should identify the relevant period or data date where that context affects interpretation.
Readers should consult the issuer’s latest filings before relying on a figure. A displayed “Last reviewed” date means the article was reviewed on that date; it does not mean every linked source or market value is continuously updated.
Calculation methodology and verification
Financial measures often have more than one accepted definition. We therefore aim to:
- State the numerator and denominator.
- Identify the period and currency when material.
- Match operating measures with operating claims and equity measures with equity claims.
- Use average balance-sheet values when they better match a period of income or cash flow.
- Explain material adjustments, such as excess cash, leases, goodwill, non-controlling interests, stock-based compensation, restructuring charges, and capitalized research and development.
- Avoid mixing data from incompatible dates without disclosure.
- Preserve enough source information for a calculation to be reproduced.
Material calculations are checked for formula selection, input consistency, units, signs, and arithmetic. Worked examples may be simplified for education; when they are hypothetical, the article should say so.
Non-GAAP and analyst-constructed measures—including EBITDA, free cash flow, and return on invested capital—can vary by company or data provider. We do not treat a label as a standardized definition. The stated reconciliation and assumptions control.
Interpretation and uncertainty
A ratio is evidence, not a verdict. We generally evaluate a measure across several periods, compare it with economically similar businesses, and consider the company’s industry, accounting choices, capital structure, and business cycle.
Forward-looking estimates are inherently uncertain. Scenario ranges do not represent guaranteed outcomes or probabilities unless the article expressly provides and supports those probabilities. We avoid false precision and state material assumptions that could change the conclusion.
Review, updates, and corrections
Articles may be reviewed when:
- A company files new financial statements or materially restates prior results.
- A transaction, financing event, accounting change, or regulatory development affects the analysis.
- A cited source changes or becomes unavailable.
- A reader identifies a possible error.
- The editorial team determines that an explanation, calculation, or disclosure is no longer sufficiently clear.
Minor edits may correct spelling, formatting, or links without changing the conclusion. Material corrections should be made promptly after verification. Where useful to readers, we may add a correction or update note describing what changed and when.
To report a suspected error, send the page URL, the statement or calculation in question, and supporting evidence to research@stockmetriclab.com. Do not send passwords, account numbers, brokerage statements, or other sensitive personal information.
We review correction requests on their merits. Contacting us does not guarantee a particular change or an individual response.
Use of artificial intelligence
Stock Metric Lab may use AI-assisted tools during research, outlining, drafting, calculation checks, editing, formatting, link checks, or site maintenance. AI output is not treated as an authoritative source.
Our standards apply regardless of whether AI contributed to a draft:
- Material factual claims should be supported by appropriate sources.
- Calculations and formulas should be independently checked against their inputs.
- Citations should be opened and reviewed rather than accepted from an AI-generated reference list.
- AI-generated wording should be reviewed for unsupported certainty, omissions, and misleading simplification.
- Confidential personal or account information should not be intentionally included in public content or prompts used for editorial work.
Editorial responsibility remains with Stock Metric Lab. The use of an AI tool does not transfer responsibility for accuracy, fairness, or corrections to the tool provider.
Independence and conflicts of interest
Editorial conclusions should not be purchased or dictated by a company covered in an article. If Stock Metric Lab publishes sponsored material, receives compensation tied to a specific piece of content, or has another material relationship that could reasonably affect a reader’s assessment, that relationship should be disclosed clearly near the relevant content.
Writers and reviewers should disclose material financial interests or relationships that could create an actual or perceived conflict, including a material position in a discussed security when relevant. A disclosure does not eliminate a conflict; it gives readers information needed to evaluate it.
Stock Metric Lab does not claim that the absence of a disclosed conflict proves complete neutrality. Readers should assess the evidence, assumptions, and source documents themselves.
Corrections, feedback, and complaints
We welcome evidence-based questions about a source, formula, table, or conclusion. Contact research@stockmetriclab.com and include:
- The URL of the relevant page.
- A concise description of the suspected issue.
- The source or calculation that supports the proposed correction.
We do not provide personalized portfolio advice, security recommendations, tax advice, legal advice, or accounting services by email.
Important disclaimer
All Stock Metric Lab content is provided for educational and informational purposes only. It is not investment, financial, tax, legal, or accounting advice; an offer or solicitation; or a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security or financial product.
Investing involves risk, including loss of principal. Historical results do not guarantee future performance. Estimates, scenarios, valuations, and financial ratios depend on source data and assumptions that may be incomplete, delayed, revised, or incorrect. Stock Metric Lab does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or fitness of content for any particular purpose.
You are responsible for conducting your own research and, when appropriate, consulting qualified professionals who understand your circumstances before making financial decisions.
Policy updates
We may revise this policy as our editorial methods, tools, or content change. The review date at the top of this page identifies the latest completed policy review.