item_1a for Risk Factors or item_7 for MD&A. It is for reading and citing a selected filing section, not for proving that a topic is absent, extracting the filing’s exhibits, or interpreting the disclosure for the reader.
Reader job: retrieve the section from the intended filing
Pin an accession number whenever the result must be reproducible. Use the latest-section route only when a monitor intentionally follows the newest matching filing, then store the accession it resolves to on each run.Retrieve a known 10-K section
GET /v1/filings/{accession_number}/sections/{section_key} returns the named extracted section. ticker, cik, and form are optional resolution hints; do not send hints that conflict with the accession. A full response supplies contentMd and filing context, including the resolved accession and source URL. Keep those fields and requestId with downstream quotations.
Use mode=compact for triage. view=agent is an identity-and-citation projection: it keeps fields such as key, accessionNumber, and source_url but does not include the section body. Request mode=full when an application needs the text.
Follow the current annual filing deliberately
GET /v1/filings/latest/sections/{section_key} defaults to form=10-K; specify the form in production so the workflow documents its intent. “Latest” is time-dependent, not a permanent document identifier.
Source handling and limits
The extracted markdown is an application-friendly representation of a filing section. It can omit layout-dependent tables, exhibits, cross-references, or definitions outside the selected section. A404 can mean that the accession or section key was not resolved or extracted; it is not evidence that the topic is absent from the filing.
For a material statement, retain the accession number, form, filing date, section key, filing URL, requestId, and available provenance or freshness. Open the SEC source to assess table content, qualifiers, and surrounding context. Use filing search when you must select the correct historical filing first.