The SEC is weighing one of the most significant changes to public company disclosure in decades: moving mandatory reporting from quarterly to semiannual. At Morningstar, we’ve effectively been running that experiment for more than 20 years. We’ve never hosted a quarterly earnings call — not once since our Dutch auction IPO in 2005. So when I say this reform is worth making, I’m not speaking theoretically.
The U.S. public markets are world-class. They force companies to operate in the open and make them easier and cheaper for everyday Americans to invest in. The disclosure rules and continuous oversight mean investors get timely, comparable information. As a result, capital is priced better, misconduct is harder to hide, and investment fees are lower. We need more, not fewer, companies to opt in to public markets.
