How common is it for multinational corporations to issue annual reports in a variety of languages?

[Boojatta]

Typically, in how many different languages would an annual report be issued?

[gristy]

1. 6

[Boojatta]

3. Why six?

Is an annual report written in one language and then translated into five specific languages that you can name and that collectively cover the languages understood by a large segment of the investing public?

[gristy]

5. I really don't know. I just made that up.

[MADem]

2. Where are the principal shareholders? There's your answer. NT

[Boojatta]

4. Do you mean the principal investors at the time of the initial public offering?

Is it common for corporations to request information about each investor's language preferences and to maintain that information in a database of information about current shareholders?

[MADem]

7. No.

If twenty percent of the dough that is invested in the company, or comes IN to their company by way of purchases, comes out of Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, or other Arab nations, you're going to include Arabic in that bunch of languages. If a boat load of cash is coming out of Russia, a translation for the tovariches is going to happen. If you're getting a shitload of cash from Canada, you're gonna see English AND French, because that's how Canada rolls.

It's not "investor's language preferences' that are at issue, or even IPO investors--the question was about MULTINATIONALS. They know where their money is coming from day by day, year by year--that's what drives their train. They know where their retail assets are, and supporting those assets are personnel and infrastructure of varying sizes.

I'll bet WALMART does their fancy glossy "Yearbook" in a dozen or more languages. Same with TOYOTA. It's all about where you play.

[Boojatta]

6. If they're in Switzerland, then does the corporation issue

reports in at least four different languages?

[MADem]

8. If they are issuing a report IN a country, they've got to go by the rules of that country.

If the guys at HONDA are issuing their worldwide report, and are producing a "Canadian edition" that highlights their production and sales in Canada, it's going to be in English and French, or they'll run afoul of the government there.