SEC Chairman Paul Atkins is teeing up a potential shake-up in how often public companies have to open their books, suggesting that the cadence of corporate disclosures should track a firm's size and maturity. Speaking Tuesday in Washington, he said the agency is looking at whether some companies might no longer need to file every quarter, a trial balloon that immediately revived the long-running fight over whether the quarterly grind fuels short-term thinking.
According to Bloomberg, Atkins told attendees that the SEC is considering "scaling the frequency of corporate disclosures to a firm's size" and suggested such a change could "save companies significant time and money." The remarks came during a keynote listed on the agency's calendar for the DC Blockchain Summit on March 17, where the SEC shows Atkins as a featured speaker.
Where the idea came from
The concept tracks with President Trump's September 2025 push to move mandatory quarterly earnings reports to a semiannual schedule, a nudge that put pressure on the agency to lay out possible responses, according to CNBC. Atkins has framed the broader disclosure rethink around two principles: materiality and scaling. In his view, smaller or newer issuers should not be saddled with the same reporting workload as the market's biggest players.
How companies and investors would be affected
Supporters, including some exchange officials and corporate advisers, argue that a scaled approach could cut compliance costs, free executives from living quarter to quarter and make public markets a less daunting place for smaller firms to list. That view is reflected in analysis from WTW and Gowling WLG, which note that trimming back routine filings could let management lean more on long-term strategy and less on crafting every three-month earnings narrative.
Critics counter that fewer required filings would thin out the steady stream of data that analysts and smaller investors rely on, potentially weakening an important safeguard for market transparency. They also warn that if reporting calendars begin to diverge, it could complicate contracts, lending arrangements and exchange rules that currently assume a predictable quarterly rhythm.
What comes next
Any real change will have to go through the SEC's formal notice-and-comment rulemaking process. That means staff would draft a proposal, the Commission would vote to publish it, and the public would get a set period to weigh in before any final rule gets a thumbs up or down, a sequence laid out on the agency's rulemaking pages at the SEC. The agency notes that such proceedings often stretch for months and typically attract lengthy, highly technical letters from exchanges, investor advocates and corporate lobbying groups.
For now, companies and investors are waiting to see whether staff formally recommend a scaled-reporting proposal. If one lands, the comment file will quickly become the main battlefield, as CFOs, auditors and exchanges use that window to push for, or argue loudly against, dialing back the quarterly reporting regime.
