Editorial standards
How we research, check and correct what we publish
Bankerly’s articles and deal data are meant to be quoted by owners, their advisors and the tools they use. This page sets out how each piece is made, what the dates on it mean, and how to tell us when something is wrong.
How an article is made
- 1
Topics come from what owners ask
We write for one reader: the owner of a private company thinking about a sale. Topics come from the questions owners type into search engines and AI assistants, and from the questions that come up in real sale processes.
- 2
Every claim starts at a primary source
Rules and figures are researched at the source before a word is written: the IRS and the Internal Revenue Code for tax, the SEC, FINRA and state regulators for securities and advisory rules, the FDA, CMS and other agencies for regulated industries, statutes and regulations for legal mechanics, and established publishers for market data. Market ranges from a third party are attributed by name and presented as one data point, not a consensus.
- 3
Drafted with AI assistance, then checked claim by claim
Articles are drafted with the help of AI tools working from those sources. A separate fact-checking pass then reads each cited source and tests every factual claim against it; a claim the source does not support is corrected or removed before publication. Bankerly builds its software around AI and says so; it does not let a model's unchecked output stand as fact.
- 4
Automated checks before anything ships
Each article must pass checks that run on every change to the site: no personal names, no promotional clichés, titles and descriptions sized for search results, and a Sources list. Deal figures pass their own checks against the transaction database before they are published.
Who writes it
The library is written and maintained by the Bankerly team, and the site carries no individual bylines. What stands behind an article is the process above and the sources listed at its end, which every reader can check.
What the dates mean
- Published is the day an article first appeared.
- Updated appears only when the article’s substance changed: a rule changed, a figure was refreshed, a section was rewritten or a correction was made. Formatting and link changes do not count, and the date is never moved to make a page look fresh.
- Deal data pages state the month their data runs to and recompute as transactions are added. The quarterly snapshots are fixed when published and never silently change; a correction to one is shown on the page with what moved and why.
Our deal data
Multiples come from a database of publicly disclosed transactions, each with a link to its source. Figures from fewer than eight transactions are withheld, and every published figure states its sample size and basis. The full rules, including what is rejected and how two reports of one deal are reconciled, are on the methodology page.
Independence
No article is sponsored, and no firm pays to be mentioned. Companies named in deal tables appear because a transaction was publicly disclosed. Bankerly is mentioned at most once in an article, as one option among several.
Education, not advice
The library explains how sales of private companies usually work. It is not legal, tax, accounting or investment advice, and it cannot account for a specific company’s facts; an owner’s own attorney, CPA and advisors make those calls. Valuation figures on this site are educational estimates, not appraisals.
Corrections
If something on this site is wrong or out of date, email hello@bankerly.ai with the page and the claim. We check it against the source, correct the page if it is wrong, and the article then shows an Updated date.