Newsletters and Other Publications Realpoint Morningstar Equity Research Morningstar, Inc. 2010 Annual Report 37 As of December 31, 2010, we offered independent equity research  on approximately 2,300 companies globally. Our approach to stock  analysis focuses on long-term fundamentals. Our analysts evaluate  companies by assessing each firm’s competitive advantage, analyz- ing the level of business risk, and completing an in-depth projection  of future cash flows. For the companies we cover, our analysts  prepare a fair value estimate, a Morningstar Rating for stocks, a  rating for business risk, and an assessment of the company’s eco- nomic moat. Economic moat is a concept originally developed by  Warren Buffett that describes a company’s competitive advantage  relative to other companies. For the remaining stocks included in our  database, we offer quantitative grades for growth, profitability, and  financial health, as well as an explanation of the company’s business  operations. We currently deliver our equity research to individual  investors as part of our Premium Membership service on Morningstar. com, as well as to several other companies who provide our research  to their affiliated financial advisors or to individual investors. Our print publications compete primarily with Agora Publishing,  Forbes , InvestorPlace Media, The Motley Fool, and Value Line. In 2011, we plan to develop a newsletter application for the new  iPad platform with the goal of attracting new users, especially  younger ones, and providing a new source of revenue through appli- cation fees, subscription fees, and/or advertising sales. We plan  to begin by delivering newsletter content via an iPad application  for  Morningstar StockInvestor  and plan to roll out similar capabili- ties for other newsletters throughout 2011. We offer a variety of print and electronic publications about invest- ing. Some of these include  Morningstar Mutual Funds , a reference  publication that features our signature one-page reports on approx- imately 1,500 mutual funds;  Morningstar FundInvestor , a monthly  newsletter that provides information and insight on 500 of the most  popular mutual funds and a list of 150 AnalystPicks;  Morningstar  StockInvestor , a monthly newsletter that focuses on companies with  strong competitive positions and stock prices that we believe are  low enough to provide investors with a margin of safety;  Morningstar  ETFInvestor , a monthly newsletter with specific investment ideas,  recommendations, model portfolios, and data on exchange-traded  funds; and the  Ibbotson Stocks, Bonds, Bills, and Inflation Yearbook ,  a definitive study of historical capital markets data in the United  States. In addition, we offer several other investment newsletters  and a series of books about investing and personal finance, which  are available directly from us and in bookstores. We currently provide analyst reports on virtually all of the most  widely held stocks in the S&P 500 index, as well as numerous com- panies included in other major indexes. We had approximately 117  equity and credit analysts around the world as of December 31, 2010,  compared with 108 as of December 31, 2009. In 2010, we rolled out an expanded research format for our institu- tional clients, including more in-depth analysis of the company’s  economic moat, scenario analysis, and capital structure, as well as  our analysts’ specific multi-year forecasts for dozens of operating  and financial metrics. We also initiated credit ratings on nearly 600 firms, bringing our  total to more than 720, including banks, insurers, and REITs, and rolled  out detailed credit analyses for most of these. The research is aimed  at institutions and advisors, and includes a monthly credit Best Ideas  list, weekly Credit Update, and detailed credit research reports. Our Equity Research services compete with The Applied Finance  Group, Credit Suisse HOLT, Renaissance Capital, Standard & Poor’s,  Value Line, Zacks Investment Research, and several smaller research  firms. Competitors for our credit research include Credit Sights,  Egan-Jones, Fitch, Gimme Credit, Moody’s, and Standard & Poor’s. Pricing for Morningstar Equity and Credit Research varies based on  the level of distribution, the number of securities covered, the amount  of custom coverage required, and the length of the contract term. Acquired by Morningstar in May 2010, Realpoint is an NRSRO  specializing in structured finance. It offers securities ratings,  research, surveillance services, and data to help institutional  investors identify risk in commercial mortgage-backed securities  (CMBS). Realpoint rates new-issue securities by analyzing the  individual loan, loan portfolio, and issuing trust. It publishes  comprehensive pre-sale reports that include ratings for each class  of the transaction, required subordination levels, detailed  underwriting of 100% of the assets in the pool, and an in-depth  asset summary for every property in the transaction. Realpoint  secured ratings assignments on five of the 16 CMBS transactions  that came to market in 2010.