Every few years, the question arises as to whether quarterly reporting is the optimal timeframe for U.S. public companies.  Now, with both President Donald Trump and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins as active proponents of ending quarterly SEC reporting, regulatory reform seems more likely than ever before.  Thanks to experimentation with reporting frequency in the European Union (EU) and the United Kingdom (UK), it is possible to make a few observations about potential reforms and a few predictions as to how regulatory change would affect financial reporting in practice.

Overall, reducing reporting from a quarterly to a semi-annual schedule is likely to have less effect than either its critics fear or its proponents hope, as demonstrated by the EU and UK experience.  Revising the mandatory reporting schedule will not, on its own, remove short-termism from the capital markets.  And it will not suffice to reverse the long and troubling decline in the number of public companies in the United States.  However, it would be a step in the right direction.

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