MORNINGSTAR, INC.

'Morningstar, Inc.' () is a provider of independent investment research in the United States and in major international markets.

Contents

Business Description

Corporate History

Corporate Identity

Acquisitions

See also

External links

References

Business Description

The company offers Internet-, software-, and print-based products and services for individuals, financial advisors, and institutional clients. Morningstar provides data on more than 125,000 investment offerings, including stocks, mutual funds, and ETFs. The company has operations in 16 countries.
Morningstar created its Morningstar Rating rating service, Morningstar Style Box and other lesser known proprietary measures in order to assist individual investors in understanding their investments. Morningstar provides valuable free tools to individual investors on each of its regional websites.
Morningstar representative Don Phillips also figured prominently in the 2004 Senate hearings on how to correct some actions performed by many investment companies, brokerage companies, and ultimately mutual fund companies with respect to market timing Arbitrage.

Corporate History

Founder Joe Mansueto initially had the idea for Morningstar in 1982, while reviewing mutual fund annual reports he had requested from several prominent fund managers^[2]. However, it was only after a year working as a stock analyst for Harris Associates, seeing the fund industry and potential competitors up close, that he was convinced that the opportunity was there^2[3]. Morningstar was subsequently founded in 1984 from his one-bedroom Chicago apartment with an initial investment of US$80,000^[4]. The name Morningstar is taken from the last sentence in Walden, a book by Henry David Thoreau; "the sun is but a morning star"^4[5].
In July 1999 Morningstar accepted an investment of US$91 million from SoftBank in return for a 20% stake in the company. The two companies had the previous year formed a joint venture in Japan ^[6]5.
On May 6 2004 the company announced that it had filed the necessary registration documents for an initial public offering^[7]. These documents were subsequently amended on February 3^[8] and April 8 2005^[9]. The IPO went ahead on May 3, with 7,612,500 shares made available at $18.50 per share^[10]. The manner in which Morningstar went public is notable. They elected to follow Google's footsteps and use the dutch auction method rather than the traditional method. This allowed individual investors to bid on the price of the stock, and allowed all investors equal access.
As of March 2007 Joe Mansueto owned approximately 70% of the outstanding shares in Morningstar. Morningstar Investor Q&A - March 2007

Corporate Identity

Morningstar's current logo is notable in that it was designed by legendary graphic designer Paul Rand. Mansueto sought Rand out in 1989 after deciding that the companys design standards needed to be improved, and that the first step to this was a redesign of their logo^[11]. After several phone calls, letters and finally a trip to meet him in person, Mansueto convinced Rand to work on the logo, which was completed within four months¹¹. The new design features the "o" in Morningstar appearing as a rising sun, which is a nod to the quote that inspired the companys name⁴. While the fee for this work ($50,000) was a significant amount at the time for the company, Mansueto considers it "one of our most valuable assets"¹¹.

Acquisitions

Since 2003 Morningstar has undertaken several acquisitions which have expanded the breadth and depth of it's product offerings.

Asset Acquired	Acquired From	Date Announced	Date Completed	Reported Cost
mPower.com, Inc	Privately Held	May 30 2003[12]	July 2 2003[13]	Not Disclosed
ePiper Separate Account Database	Pensions & Investments	September 7 2004[14]	Not Disclosed	Not Disclosed
VARDS	Finetre Corporation	January 11 2005[15]	January 4 200515	US$9 million
Ibbotson Associates	Privately Held	December 12 2005[16]	March 1 2006[17]	US$83 million
Aspect Huntley	Unknown	July 2 2006[18]	July 25 2006[19]	AU$30 million
Institutional Hedge Fund & Separate Account Database Division	InvestorForce, Inc.	July 17 2006[20]	August 1 2006[21]	US$10 million
Fund Data Business (prev. Micropal & Assirt)	Standard & Poor's	February 22 2007[22][23]	March 16 2007[24][25]	US$55 million

See also

★ Standard & Poor's

★ Moody's

★ Fitch Ratings

★ A.M. Best

★ Dominion Bond Rating Service

★ Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organizations

★ Reuters

★ Bloomberg L.P.

External links

★ Official website

★ Corporate website

★ Understanding the Star Rating and Fund Analyst Picks (from www.morningstar.com)

★ Don Phillips Senate Testimony

References

1. Morningstar 2006 Annual Report
2. Everything I Know, I Learned from Warren Buffett, Corporate Culture Article - Inc. Article
3. Joe Mansueto and Bill Nygren: The Importance of Having Conviction
4. USATODAY.com - Can he turn magazine bust into a boom?
5. A star is reborn after shake-up
6. Company News; Softbank says it will invest million in Morningstar
7. Morningstar Press Release
8. Morningstar Press Release
9. Morningstar Press Release
10. Morningstar Press Release
11. Corporate Design Foundation - @issue journal
12. Morningstar Press Release
13. Morningstar Press Release
14. Morningstar Press Release
15. Morningstar Press Release
16. Morningstar Press Release
17. Morningstar Press Release
18. Morningstar Press Release
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20. Morningstar Press Release
21. Morningstar Press Release
22. Morningstar Press Release
23. Standard & Poor's Press Release
24. Morningstar Press Release
25. Standard & Poor's Press Release