An annual report is a comprehensive statement describing a company's activities throughout the preceding year. Annual reports are intended to provide shareholders and other interested stakeholders informed about the company's activities and financial performance. All public corporations must provide shareholders with a financial report every year so that shareholders understand and are able to assess overall performance.

The first part of the report often contains an impressive combination of graphics, photos, and an accompanying narrative, all of which chronicle the company's activities over the past year. The back part of the report contains detailed financial and operational information.

read and assess the financial performance of IBM, Inc. over the past couple of years. Begin by downloading the latest IBM annual report from AnnualReports.com. Once you have accessed the website, search for IBM, and then download the most recent annual report in a PDF format. Read pages 1-28, and then find the financial data (i.e., income statements, balance sheets and statements of cash flows) on pages 78-81.

Look for trends that identify areas of strength, stability, or possible concern. Finally, in Section 4, find two additional scholarly reports that discuss IBM's financial performance during this period and discuss how those professional reports correlate with what you found in your analysis.