The 10-Q Rarely Breaks Earnings News. So Why Keep It?

Based on research by K. Ramesh (Rice Business), Donal Byard (Baruch College, CUNY), Edward Li (Baruch College, CUNY) and Min Shen (George Mason University)

Key takeaways:

• The SEC has proposed letting public companies file a semiannual Form 10-S instead of three quarterly 10-Qs — the first proposed change to reporting frequency in half a century.
• For most companies, quarterly filings don’t break earnings news: across 240,000 filings, the market barely reacted to most 10-Qs except when they coincided with the release of earnings.
• The 10-Q still provides the standardized, reviewed record that keeps companies comparable and accountable, which is why the research favors optional reporting over eliminating it.
   

Mandatory quarterly reports have been a standard part of U.S. capital markets for over 50 years. Since 1970, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has required public companies to file a quarterly Form 10-Q and an annual Form 10-K. Investors have long viewed this reporting cadence as fundamental to market stability.

In May 2026, the SEC proposed loosening that requirement. Under a potential rule change, companies would be able to file a semiannual 10-S instead of the quarterly 10-Q. The proposal has sparked significant debate, which mostly runs in two directions: Supporters say less frequent reporting would pull executives away from a focus on short-term results. And critics say it would erode executive accountability.

Drawing on decades of research, K. Ramesh, the Herbert S. Autrey Professor of Accounting at Rice Business, co-authored a comment letter to the SEC, along with academic colleagues from Baruch College, CUNY and George Mason University, supporting the proposal’s aim to give firms the option to report either quarterly or semiannually. The comment letter was picked up by the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance blog.

“Given that firms are heterogeneous across multiple dimensions, such as size, industry, age, complexity, and investor base, the optimal reporting frequency is likely to vary across firms,” the authors write. “Firm management is also well positioned to evaluate the costs and benefits of reporting more or less frequently.”

Several findings from the authors’ research speak directly to supporting the proposal:

• The 10-Q rarely breaks the news. In a study of more than 240,000 SEC filings, the market barely moved for most 10-Qs. The earnings news typically arrived earlier through a press release and was already priced in.
• Analysts focus on the earnings release, rather than the filing. They revise their forecasts when a company announces its earnings, not on the date of the formal SEC filing. But the authors caution that firms that intervene most in their own earnings disclose the least.
• Voluntary disclosures are tailored. Companies disclose what their investors value, ranging from EBITDA to balance-sheet detail depending on the business. 
• Standardized filings feed the whole system. Newswires and data aggregators pull value from periodic filings and redistribute it. The 10-Q remains a critical input for intermediaries that investors rely on.

Taken together, the research undermines both sides of the for/against binary — finding that the 10-Q is neither indispensable nor obsolete.

“Given that firms are heterogeneous across multiple dimensions, such as size, industry, age, complexity, and investor base, the optimal reporting frequency is likely to vary across firms,” the authors write.

Even though the 10-Q rarely breaks earnings news, it still delivers a standardized, legally disciplined record that every company files the same way. It’s provides a baseline that, under securities regulations, makes firms comparable and filings searchable. 

The comment letter authors favor the SEC’s middle ground of letting firms choose the reporting cadence that best suits their investors while preserving the safeguards that keep voluntary disclosure honest — especially Regulation Fair Disclosure (aka Reg FD), which bars companies from sharing material information before disclosing it publicly.

But a shared baseline equalizes access to information, not the ability to act on it. Ramesh points to research by his Rice Business colleagues, professors of finance Alan Crane, Kevin Crotty and Tarik Umar, to sharpen the distinction between disseminating and processing information.

“Research from my Rice Business colleagues shows that making information public does not eliminate differences in how quickly and effectively investors process it,” he says. “For the debate about reporting frequency, the lesson is that disclosure rules can broaden and equalize access, but they cannot eliminate the incentives or advantages associated with faster information processing and price discovery.”

The comment letter authors also argue that many companies will keep issuing quarterly updates no matter what the SEC decides, simply because their investors demand it. A firm whose shareholders rely on quarterly numbers to price the stock will either provide them or pay a higher cost of capital. They also note that market demand for interim reporting predates the 1970 mandate. The NYSE was pushing listed companies to report as far back as the 1920s.

There is one practical challenge with semiannual reporting that the comment letter identifies: If a company reports its first six months in a 10-S and its full-year results in a 10-K, investors would have to calculate second-half performance themselves by subtracting the semiannual figures from the annual. Because that calculation invites errors, the authors recommend requiring semiannual filers to report second-half results separately in their 10-K.

“There is a delicate balance to preserve,” the authors write, “allowing for firm-level flexibility, while maintaining across-firm comparability.” They argue that optional semiannual reporting can strike that balance, but only if the SEC preserves the shared rules and infrastructure that make corporate disclosures useful, fair and trustworthy.

The comment period closed July 6, 2026, and the Wall Street Journal reported it drew more than 200,000 letters, with the overwhelming majority opposed. The SEC has not announced a timetable for final action.

Written by Scott Pett

“Comment Letter on the SEC’s Proposal to Replace Quarterly Reporting with Semiannual Reporting,” posted on Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance blog (2026).

Crane, Crotty & Umar. “Hedge Funds and Public Information Acquisition,” Management Science (2023).