Given concerns in the market about evolving tariff policies, have more S&P 500 companies than normal cited the term “uncertainty” during their earnings conference calls for the first quarter?
The answer is yes. FactSet Document Search (which allows users to search for key words or phrases across multiple document types) was used to answer this question. Through Document Search, FactSet searched for the term “uncertainty” in the conference call transcripts of all the S&P 500 companies that conducted earnings conference calls from March 15 through May 15.
Of these companies, 381 cited the term “uncertainty” during their earnings calls for the first quarter. This number is well above the 5-year average of 224 and the 10-year average of 179. This number is also more than double the number recorded in the previous quarter (187).
In fact, this quarter marks the highest number of S&P 500 companies citing “uncertainty” on earnings calls for a quarter since Q1 2020 (393). The number for Q1 2025 is also the second-highest number recorded over the past 10 years, trailing only Q1 2020.
On a percentage basis, the term “uncertainty” has been cited on 84% of the 451 earnings calls conducted by S&P 500 companies since March 15.
At the sector level, the Industrials (69) and Financials (68) sectors have the highest number of S&P 500 companies citing “uncertainty” on earnings calls for Q1 2025, while the Financials (96%), Real Estate (93%), and Industrials (92%) sectors have the highest percentages of S&P 500 companies citing “uncertainty” on earnings calls for Q1 2025.
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