Connecting SDC's M&A database to Compustat requires gvkey's for both the acquirer and target (if they are traded/public). Gordon Phillips and Alexei Zhdanov (RFS, 2013) created the first major mapping between firms in SDC and Compustat using a combination of name and date matching. Gaps where filled in using this website that replicates the gvkey search in WRDS. The data was used in Ewens, Peters and Wang (2018). Either myself or a research assistant searched all M&As deals from 1996-2016 that did not have a gvkey in the Phillips and Zhdanov data, comparing names and dates by hand.

The data connecting SDC deal number to gvkeys is in csv form with the following structure:

(DealNumber, tgvkey, agvkey)

where

• DealNumber: SDC identifier for deals.
• agvkey: the acquirer gvkey (can be missing)
• tgvkey: the target gvkey (can be missing)

Note that this includes all deals where we could find a gvkey for either the acquirer or target. Basic statistics as of Nov. 20th, 2018:

• 100,454 deals with agvkey
• 50,248 deals with tgveky
• 22,259 with both agvkey and tgveky

The second file was built by taking all the SDC name-CUSIP pairs without a match in the main repo's mapping (above) and comparing them to all Compustat-GVKEY pairs. The match is then done on SDC names-Compustat names. Note that this is a time-invariant mapping based entirely on company names (so there can be multiple SDC CUSIPs to one Compustat GVKEY as a company changes its CUSIP over time). From Daniel Yang (Ohio State).

Stay tuned (i.e., watch or star this repo.) for updates. Any errors or fill-ins, please email [email protected].

@article{phillips2013r,
  title={R\&D and the Incentives from Merger and Acquisition Activity},
  author={Phillips, Gordon M and Zhdanov, Alexei},
  journal={The Review of Financial Studies},
  volume={26},
  number={1},
  pages={34--78},
  year={2013},
  publisher={Society for Financial Studies}
  }

and

@article{ewensPetersWang2018,
 title={Acquisition prices and the measurement of intangible capital},
 author={Ewens, Michael and Peters, Ryan and Wang, Sean},
 journal={Working Paper}
 year={2018}
 }