<P> In many countries, there are forms of organization which are restricted to and are commonly used by private companies, for example the private company limited by shares in the United Kingdom (abbreviated Ltd) or unlimited company and the proprietary limited company (abbreviated Pty Ltd) or unlimited proprietary company (abbreviated Pty) in Australia . </P> <P> Privately held companies generally have fewer or less comprehensive reporting requirements and obligations for transparency, via annual reports, etc. than publicly traded companies do . For example, in the United States, unlike in Europe, privately held companies are not generally required to publish their financial statements . By not being required to disclose details about their operations and financial outlook, private companies are not forced to disclose information that may potentially be valuable to competitors and can avoid the immediate erosion of customer and stakeholder confidence in the event of financial duress . Further, with limited reporting requirements and shareholder expectations, private firms are afforded a greater operational flexibility by being able to focus on long term growth rather than quarterly earnings . In addition, private company executives may steer their ships without shareholder approval, allowing them to take significant action without delays . In Australia, Part 2E of the Corporations Act 2001 requires that publicly traded companies file certain documents relating to their annual general meeting with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission . There is a similar requirement for large proprietary companies, which are required to lodge Form 388H to the ASIC containing their financial report . In the United States, private companies are held to different accounting auditing standards than are public companies, overseen by the Private Company Counsel division of FASB . </P> <P> Researching private companies and private companies' financials can involve contacting the Secretary of State for the state of incorporation (or for LLC or partnership, state of formation), or using specialized private company databases such as Dun & Bradstreet or PrivCo . Other companies, like Sageworks, provide aggregated data on privately held companies, segmented by industry code . </P> <P> Privately held companies also sometimes have restrictions on how many shareholders they may have . For example, the U.S. Securities Exchange Act of 1934, section 12 (g), limits a privately held company, generally, to fewer than 2000 shareholders, and the U.S. Investment Company Act of 1940, requires registration of investment companies that have more than 100 holders . In Australia, section 113 of the Corporations Act 2001 limits a privately held company to fifty non-employee shareholders . </P>

List three major types of business in the private sector