But some investor advocates and many finance experts reacted with alarm, saying less frequent disclosures will lead to less transparency because companies could withhold important information for up to six months. Prof. Salman Arif from the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management says moving to reporting earnings twice a year could potentially lead to illegal activities by companies because there would be less chances for investors to scrutinize their financial numbers. "If we want to reduce accounting fraud, reduce opportunities for insider trading, improve the strength of our capital markets, and allow companies to invest for the long run, I think more transparency is is truly beneficial," Arif says. Any action on disclosures would take a while The Securities and Exchange Commission — the main regulator for stocks — has mandated since 1970 that companies report their quarterly earnings four times a year. Bigger companies typically also hold investors calls in which executives take questions from analysts about their performance and give "guidance" of what to expect going forward. The process can sometimes lead to big drops in share prices if a company's results significantly miss what investors were expecting, or if a company issues a disappointing guidance — and conversely, big gains if the company does much better. , President Trump says getting rid of a quarterly reporting requirement for public companies would lower costs and help businesses., President Donald Trump wants to do away with the quarterly earnings report. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said securities regulators should stop requiring companies to issue financial reports every three months and instead switch to a six-month reporting period..