- As of May 24, 2026, the SEC formally advanced a rulemaking proposal that could allow public companies to report earnings twice per year rather than four times, according to CNBC.
- The initiative aligns with longstanding Trump administration priorities to reduce corporate compliance burdens and would bring U.S. disclosure standards closer to European norms.
- Financial data aggregators and compliance software companies — including S&P Global (SPGI), FactSet Research Systems (FDS), and Workiva (WK) — face direct supply chain implications from reduced reporting volume.
- Supporters cite a reduction in short-termism; critics from the CFA Institute and investor advocacy groups warn the change could leave retail investors with longer blind spots between earnings windows.
What Happened
What if the Wall Street earnings calendar — four seasons per year, predictable as clockwork — turns out to be a policy choice rather than a market necessity? That question moved from hypothetical to regulatory reality on May 24, 2026, when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission advanced a formal rulemaking proposal that could allow public companies to shift from quarterly to semi-annual earnings reporting. According to Google News reporting via CNBC, the move reflects priorities set by the Trump administration to streamline corporate compliance obligations. Reuters subsequently added important context, noting the proposal would not ban voluntary quarterly reporting — companies could still choose to report four times per year if they wished. The Wall Street Journal framed the debate around management bandwidth: under current SEC rules, public companies must file a Form 10-Q within 40 to 45 days of each quarter's close — three quarterly filings plus one annual 10-K, meaning finance teams spend roughly four months of every twelve in active reporting mode. The proposed shift to semi-annual reporting would mirror the framework the European Union and the United Kingdom have operated under since the EU Transparency Directive was revised in 2014. The proposal's origins trace back to August 2018, when then-President Trump publicly floated the idea on social media, and multiple SEC reviews followed without reaching formal rulemaking. Under current SEC Chair Paul Atkins — confirmed in April 2025 — the commission has now moved the proposal into the official public comment phase, a prerequisite for any binding rule change.
Photo by Jakub Żerdzicki on Unsplash
What the Data Tells Us
The number that anchors this entire investment research debate is roughly 6,000 — the approximate count of U.S. public companies currently obligated to file quarterly reports with the SEC. Compliance cost studies cited by the American Bar Association in their 2023 regulatory burden review estimated that mid-to-large-cap companies each spend between $1 million and $2.5 million annually in combined internal staff time and external legal and accounting fees just to produce quarterly filings. For smaller public companies in the Russell 2000 index, that burden represents a proportionally larger share of operating budgets.
Chart: Mandatory periodic company filings per year under current U.S. rules (4), EU/UK standard (2), and the SEC's proposed U.S. framework (2). Sources: SEC, EU Transparency Directive.
That compliance cost data forms the core of the bull case for this proposal. The argument is not merely administrative — it has behavioral backing. A landmark study published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics found that companies subject to more frequent mandatory reporting tend to reduce R&D (research and development) spending in the periods immediately before earnings releases, a pattern consistent with short-termism (where management sacrifices long-term investment to meet near-term market expectations). Jamie Dimon and Warren Buffett co-signed a 2018 Wall Street Journal op-ed framing the quarterly earnings cycle as structurally damaging, with Buffett arguing the system encouraged companies to pass on attractive long-term investments to avoid a short-term earnings miss. The market trends supporting that critique are documented: between 2010 and 2022, U.S. public companies increased share buybacks — which boost near-term earnings per share — at a compound annual growth rate that significantly outpaced capital expenditure growth, a gap that critics attribute partly to quarterly earnings pressure. The counter-thesis, however, is grounded in equally serious data. The CFA Institute's 2024 global investor survey found that 73% of institutional investors — meaning pension funds, asset managers, and insurance companies — opposed any reduction in mandatory reporting frequency, citing the risk of longer information gaps during periods of financial stress. Bloomberg Intelligence's sector analysis from late 2025 noted that approximately 12% of quarterly earnings surprises — both positive and negative — occur exclusively in the third calendar quarter, a window when European semi-annual reporters go silent. That data point suggests reduced reporting does not eliminate volatility; it may concentrate and amplify it. Investors are watching this dynamic closely, and as Smart Finance AI noted in its analysis of Nomura's Fed rate forecast, fewer policy and data anchors in a given window consistently create asymmetric uncertainty for portfolio positioning.
Key Companies and Supply Chain
The supply chain of quarterly earnings reporting involves more participants than most retail investors recognize. Three categories of companies sit directly in the crosshairs of this stock analysis, and each warrants separate scrutiny as this rulemaking advances.
Financial Data Aggregators
S&P Global (SPGI) operates one of the most comprehensive financial data distribution networks in the world. Its Market Intelligence division — which packages earnings data, financial models, and research tools — generated approximately $4.4 billion in segment revenue as of full-year 2025 per the company's investor relations filings. Fewer mandatory filing events would reduce the raw data volume flowing through that platform, though SPGI's credit ratings and index businesses (which include the S&P 500 and Dow Jones indices) provide diversified revenue insulation. Worth researching how SPGI management characterizes regulatory risk in its 2026 annual disclosures. FactSet Research Systems (FDS) presents a more concentrated exposure: its core product is timely, granular financial data for institutional clients. A structural shift to semi-annual reporting would directly alter the cadence and density of data FactSet packages and sells to hedge funds, asset managers, and investment banks. MSCI Inc. (MSCI), while primarily an index and risk analytics provider, builds its factor models (mathematical frameworks that evaluate stock characteristics like value, momentum, and quality) using quarterly data streams. Investors are watching whether MSCI updates those model calibrations if U.S. reporting frequency halves.
Compliance and Reporting Technology
Workiva (WK) specializes in financial reporting and regulatory compliance platforms used by thousands of public companies for SEC filings. Fewer mandatory periodic reports could directly reduce transaction volume for its core EDGAR (Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval — the SEC's public database for company filings) submission tools. Donnelley Financial Solutions (DFIN), which provides end-to-end regulatory filing services, faces a similar supply chain headwind: if the number of mandatory 10-Q filings drops by 50% across 6,000 companies, the revenue and volume implications for DFIN's filing services division are material. Both companies are worth researching ahead of their next earnings calls for management commentary on rulemaking risk.
Broadly Beneficial: Industrials and Healthcare
Companies with large internal compliance and investor relations departments — aerospace manufacturers, diversified healthcare conglomerates, and financial services firms — would capture the most direct cost savings. Sector analysis suggests smaller Russell 2000 companies, where compliance costs represent a higher percentage of operating budgets, could see proportionally greater benefit.
What Should You Do? 3 Action Steps
If your portfolio includes financial data companies — FDS, SPGI, MSCI, WK, or DFIN — it is worth researching their most recent investor presentations and 10-K risk factor disclosures for language around regulatory or data volume risk. Market trends in deregulation cycles historically create asymmetric exposure for companies whose revenue is tied to compliance activity. This investment research step costs nothing and takes under an hour.
The SEC's formal rulemaking process requires a public comment window, typically 60 to 90 days from the proposal's publication in the Federal Register. The volume and composition of comment letters — industry groups arguing for the change versus investor advocacy organizations opposing it — will be a leading indicator of whether the proposal advances intact, gets modified, or stalls. The SEC's EDGAR public comment portal publishes all submissions as they are received, making this a freely accessible signal for investment research purposes.
Before treating semi-annual reporting as a purely theoretical scenario, examine your existing holdings in European-listed equities or ADRs (American Depositary Receipts — certificates representing ownership in foreign-listed companies). Many U.S. investors already own positions in companies that report on semi-annual schedules. That real-world experience provides a practical benchmark: how have you historically managed position sizing and risk during six-month information gaps? That behavioral self-assessment is a more actionable form of stock analysis preparation than speculating on the rule's final form.
Frequently Asked Questions
Would ending mandatory quarterly earnings reports hurt retail investors more than institutional investors?
Data suggests the impact would be asymmetric. Institutional investors (pension funds, hedge funds, asset managers) have proprietary data feeds, management access through investor day events, and analyst networks that generate independent earnings estimates year-round. Retail investors rely more heavily on public filings as their primary information source. A six-month window without mandatory disclosure would widen the information gap between professional and individual investors, which is the core concern raised in investment research by the CFA Institute and SEC investor advocates. That said, voluntary quarterly reporting would still be permitted under the proposal, and companies with active retail investor bases may continue quarterly updates for competitive reasons.
Which stocks could benefit most if quarterly earnings reporting becomes optional?
Sector analysis points to three categories most likely to benefit. First, small and mid-cap industrials and healthcare companies where compliance costs are high relative to total operating expenses — the savings could meaningfully improve margins. Second, companies with long investment cycles (infrastructure, pharmaceutical R&D, capital equipment manufacturing) that argue quarterly reporting forces artificial short-term framing onto multi-year projects. Third, early-stage growth companies that experience high quarter-to-quarter revenue volatility but steady long-term trajectory — less frequent mandatory reporting reduces the penalty for lumpy near-term results. Worth researching is whether any of those companies have publicly commented on the SEC proposal in their most recent earnings calls.
How does the SEC's semi-annual proposal compare to how earnings reporting works in European markets?
The European Union revised its Transparency Directive in 2014, explicitly removing the prior requirement for quarterly interim management statements. Since then, EU-listed companies have been required to publish only a semi-annual report and a full annual report — two mandatory disclosures per year. The United Kingdom maintained a similar framework after its exit from the EU. Market trends in European equities suggest the transition did not produce a sustained increase in volatility at the index level, though academic research has documented longer intervals between fraud detection events in some mid-cap cases. The SEC's proposed framework, as reported by CNBC, would structurally mirror this European standard while preserving the option for voluntary quarterly reporting.
When would the SEC's quarterly earnings proposal actually take effect if it passes?
As of May 24, 2026, the SEC's proposal is in the formal rulemaking stage, which means it has been proposed but not adopted. The standard process requires a public comment period (typically 60 to 90 days), followed by SEC staff review of comments, potential revisions, and a final commission vote. Even if the comment period closes by late summer 2026, a final rule would likely not take effect before early 2027 at the earliest — and that timeline assumes no legal challenges. Investment research tracking this process should monitor the Federal Register for the official comment deadline and watch for any Congressional response, as major SEC rules can draw legislative scrutiny under the Congressional Review Act.
Does less frequent earnings reporting lead to higher stock market volatility over time?
The relationship is more nuanced than either side of the debate typically acknowledges. Bloomberg Intelligence's sector analysis from late 2025 found that approximately 12% of quarterly earnings surprises occur specifically in Q3, a window when European semi-annual reporters go dark. That concentration effect suggests volatility is not eliminated by reducing reporting frequency — it may be redistributed into larger, less frequent events. Academic research published in the Journal of Financial Economics found that stocks with longer reporting gaps tend to exhibit larger price moves on disclosure dates, a pattern consistent with information building up during silence periods. Investors are watching whether the SEC's economic analysis in the formal rulemaking addresses this volatility redistribution question directly, as it is central to the market transparency debate.
Disclaimer: This article is for educational and informational purposes only. It does not constitute financial advice, a recommendation, or an endorsement of any security. Always do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making investment decisions. Research based on publicly available sources current as of May 24, 2026.
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