U.S. Earnings Data
Nasdaq Data Link is the largest, most comprehensive, most accurate source of Zacks earnings data on the internet. Data coverage includes consensus earnings estimates, actual earnings, earnings estimates trends and earnings surprises for thousands of North American companies.
Investors assess a company’s stock performance based on its estimated future earnings. A company’s earnings forecasts are based on analysts’ expectation of its future growth and profitability. Earnings estimates are usually reported as a “consensus estimate”, which is the average of all estimates made by analysts who follow the company’s finances.
The most important factor in influencing a stock’s value in the short term is the extent to which the company meets, exceeds, or falls short of its consensus estimates. This is called the “earnings surprise”.
Nasdaq Data Link’s Earnings databases cover earnings estimates, estimate trends, announcement dates, actual earnings, and earnings surprises. Below you will find a breakdown of the individual databases published by Zacks and hosted on Nasdaq Data Link, as well as detailed information on how to access.
Earnings Databases
Nasdaq Data Link has five databases, published by Zacks Investment Research, covering U.S. and Canadian companies’ earnings. Click on any database name to see the data, full documentation, and download options.
| Name | Description |
Zacks Earnings Estimates (ZEE) |
Updated daily, this database offers consensus earnings estimates for over 5,000U.S.and Canadian listed companies as compiled by Zacks Research. |
Zacks Street Earnings Estimates (ZSEE) |
Updated daily, this database offers consensus street earnings estimates for over 5,000U.S.and Canadian listed companies as compiled by Zacks Research. Under the Street methodology, adjustments are made for non-recurring items and stock option expenses on a case-by-case basis according to the treatment applied by the majority of covering analysts for each stock. |
Zacks Earnings Trends (ZET) |
Updated daily, this database offers recent consensus earnings estimate revision trends for over 5,000 U.S. and Canadian listed companies as compiled by Zacks Research. |
Zacks Earnings Announcements (ZEA) |
Updated daily, this database offers information on corporate earnings announcements expected over the next couple months for over 9,000 U.S. and Canadian companies, including both confirmed and estimated dates with EPS estimates, as compiled by Zacks Investment Research. |
Zacks Earnings Surprises (ZES) |
Updated daily, this database chronicles historical estimated and actual earnings and surprise calculations for 16,000+ U.S. and Canadian listed companies going as far back as 1994. |
Zacks Street Earnings Surprises (ZSES) |
Updated daily, this database chronicles historical estimated and actual street earnings for 9,000+ U.S. and Canadian listed companies over 12 quarters. Under the Street methodology, adjustments are made for non-recurring items and stock option expenses on a case-by-case basis according to the treatment applied by the majority of covering analysts for each stock. |
Zacks Preannouncement History (ZPH) |
Updated monthly, this database contains historical company guidance data for approximately 5,000 public companies going as far back as 2002. |
Zacks Consensus Earnings Estimate History (ZEEH) |
Updated daily, this database offers consensus earnings estimate revision history for over 22,000 publicly traded companies going as far back as 1979. |
Zacks EBITDA (ZEBE) |
Updated daily, this database offers EBITDA estimates for over 3,500 U.S. and Canadian listed companies as compiled by Zacks Research. |
Using the Data
All of Nasdaq Data Link’s earnings data is available to download in any format, via our API and our tools; and via our Excel add-in.
To find the data you need, you can go to any database page on Nasdaq Data Link. Click on the documentation tab to learn more about the data and how it is organized, or search within the database to find the specific datasets you need. Visit individual dataset pages to download or export the data.
Premium Data
All of the earnings databases are premium, designed for professional users. As such, they are guaranteed to be accurate, timely, well-documented and comprehensive.
About Zacks
Zacks Investment Research is the leading provider of EPS estimates and surprises data, with over 20,000 customers globally. Zacks surveys over 2,500 analysts from 185 brokerage firms in order to publish definitive consensus estimates for EPS, sales and dividends for thousands of North American companies. Zacks also aggregates actual earnings for these companies and compares them with prior analyst estimates to measure earnings surprises.
Zacks has been processing, organizing and evaluating research produced by U.S. and Canadian brokerage firms to generate estimates for earnings, sales, long-term growth rates and target prices, along with buy/hold/sell ratings, since 1981.
API Access
All datasets on Nasdaq Data Link are available via a single uniform API. Here is an example API call for Apple (AAPL) earnings estimate:
The above call gets the median estimate (column 2) for Apple’s earnings per share (EPS), in ascending date order, from the start of 2017 to the end of 2018, in CSV format, from the Consensus Earnings Estimates (ZEE) database.
Many more transformations and manipulations of the data are available; see our full API reference for more details. You can also access Nasdaq Data Link data directly from within the analysis tool of your choice — R, Python, Excel, Matlab, Maple and more — using our free tools.
Earnings Databases in Depth
In the following sections, several earnings databases are described in greater detail. Note that definitive documentation for any given database can always be found on its documentation page; what follows is merely a brief overview.
Zacks Earnings Estimates (ZEE)
This database offers consensus earnings estimates and long-term growth estimates for over 5,000 U.S. and Canadian public companies. The data derives from surveys of more than 2,600 analysts from 185 brokerage firms across North America.
Zacks provides two methodologies for computing Earnings Per Share (EPS) estimates: the Zacks proprietary method and the Street Method. This database follows the Zacks proprietary method. In this method, the EPS used in the consensus estimates is defined as the diluted EPS before non-recurring items, including employee stock options expenses. To learn more about the methodology and the dataset nomenclature in this database, please visit the ZEE documentation page.
Zacks Street Earnings Estimates (ZSEE)
This database offers consensus earnings estimates calculated by the “street” method for over 5,000 U.S. and Canadian public companies.
The “street” method differs from the Zacks proprietary method in that it adjusts the diluted EPS estimates for non-recurring items and employee stock option expenses according to what is done by the majority of analysts following each stock. To learn more about the methodology and the dataset nomenclature in this database, please visit the ZSEE documentation page.
Zacks Earnings Trends (ZET)
This database offers current EPS estimates, as well as estimates as of 7, 30, 60 and 90 days prior to the current day for over 5,000 U.S. and Canadian companies. The trends reflect changes in analysts’ estimates of forecasted values. To learn more about the methodology and the dataset nomenclature used in this database, please visit the ZET documentation page.
Zacks Earnings Announcements (ZEA)
This database offers estimated announcement dates, estimation parameters and supplemental data like EPS estimates and EPS actuals for over 9,000 U.S. and Canadian companies. For details on dataset nomenclature and organization, please visit the ZEA documentation page.
Zacks Earnings Surprises (ZES)
This database provides estimated and actual earnings for 16,000+ U.S. and Canadian public companies. To learn more about dataset nomenclature and organization, please visit the ZES documentation page.
Zacks Street Earnings Surprises (ZSES)
Updated daily, this database chronicles historical estimated and actual street earnings for 9,000+ U.S. and Canadian listed companies over 12 quarters. The earnings estimates and actuals in this data set are adjusted according to the Zacks “Street” accounting methodology wherein adjustments are made for non-recurring items and employee stock option expenses according to the treatment applied by the majority of sell-side analysts covering each stock. To learn more about dataset nomenclature and organization, please visit the ZSES documentation page.
Zacks Consensus Earnings Estimate History (ZEEH)
Zacks Earnings Estimates History database covers historical consensus earnings estimates for past annual and quarterly periods as far back as 1979 and for future annual and quarterly periods as much as four years from today. This database also 1) covers EPS, low, high, median and mean; 2) includes the number of analysts and analysts’ estimate revisions; 3) and is updated daily. To learn more about dataset nomenclature and organization, please visit the ZEEH documentation page.
These databases are available only to paying subscribers. To subscribe, please visit the Zacks vendor page. To create a free Nasdaq Data Link account, visit our sign-up page.
After subscribing, you will need to append your Nasdaq Data Link API key to each call listed below. To learn more about API keys, read our complete data API reference.
Terms and Licensing
All of Nasdaq Data Link’s earnings databases are premium products. To see the prices and subscription licenses, please visit any database page and click on “view pricing”. We offer extremely liberal terms of use, explained in clear language with minimal legalese.
Registration
Registered users enjoy unlimited downloads, unlimited API usage and free trials of all premium databases. To start your free trial of Nasdaq Data Link’s U.S. earnings data, please register for a free Nasdaq Data Link API key.
