Finding Historical Stock Data for Bankrupt and Delisted Firms
Summary
The document explains why historical stock research can be biased when datasets omit firms that have gone bankrupt or otherwise left the market. It notes that some widely used finance sites focus on surviving companies, so researchers seeking bankrupt or delisted firms may need specialized historical data sources. Commercial databases and services are suggested, with the warning that established institutional datasets can be costly for individual users.
It also mentions using historical constituent-list revisions to identify past index members, while cautioning that this workaround is unreliable and does not provide the underlying price history. Another cited dataset tracks delisted symbols and changes in security identifiers. The discussion is a set of resource suggestions rather than a data-quality comparison, and it gives no evaluation of coverage, price adjustments, or licensing terms.
Key ideas
- Survivor-only price databases can introduce survivorship bias into historical strategy research.
- Bankrupt and delisted securities may require specialized commercial datasets.
- Historical index constituent lists can help identify past tickers but are an unreliable workaround.
- A dataset with a security master can track ticker and listing changes over time.
- The suggestions do not compare data coverage, quality, or licensing terms.
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Full text
# data on historical stock price of bankrupt companies # data on historical stock price of bankrupt companies does anybody know a site where I can download historical data on stocks including companies that have gone bankrupt such as lehman brothers? it appears that bankrupt companies no longer appear in the finance sites that I know... ## Answer by Richard Herron (score 13, accepted) https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/917 Google and Yahoo finance have a survivorship bias -- they only include firms that are still around. I know of no free source that provides the data you seek. I get my data from Compustat and CRSP via the Wharton Resource Data Service, but these (or Bloomberg or Reuters) are likely too expensive for an individual. Have you asked your broker if they will sell you the data you want? ## Answer by Terco (score 8) https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/924 There is a very cheap, i.e. free, way of obtaining the list of companies included in the S&P 500 at any given time. Check the revision history for the S&P 500 List updates on Wikipedia. It is ugly and unreliable but you usually get what you pay for :) ... it should be okay if you are just playing around with your own strategies. This doesn't solve the main issue since you still need a way to get the data for those companies. But having the right ticker usually helps... ## Answer by Maria Mikhaella Beltran (score 3) https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/61794 Algoseek's data set includes delisted symbols due to bankruptcy, M&A, or any other reasons. They have a sophisticated master file to keep track of historical changes for securities. ## Answer by Eugene Osovetsky (score 2) https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/1316 Take a look at http://www.mergent.com/servius - I believe they have historical data for all companies, whether they're currently being traded or not. (Disclosure: The API is managed by my company)
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