ELEVATE Act Shields Early IPO Filings from Public View, Giving Companies 10-Day Head Start

The ELEVATE Act of 2025 (officially the Encouraging Local Emerging Ventures and Economic Growth Act) is making a key change to how companies go public, specifically targeting the initial paperwork process with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

The New IPO Warm-Up

This bill essentially creates a private 'draft mode' for companies planning an Initial Public Offering (IPO). Currently, when a company files its registration statement—the massive document detailing its finances, risks, and business plan—it immediately becomes public. Under the ELEVATE Act, any company looking to list stock on a national exchange can now submit a draft of that registration statement to the SEC staff for a confidential, private review. Think of it like submitting a sensitive document to your boss for feedback before you hit 'send all' to the entire company; it lets them clean up the messy parts without public scrutiny (SEC. 2).

The Trade-Off: Speed vs. Transparency

For the companies themselves, this is a huge procedural win. They can get crucial feedback from the SEC, iron out any compliance issues, and refine their disclosures privately. This could speed up the entire IPO timeline and reduce the risk of a market panic if an early draft contains awkward or incomplete information. For the executives and investment bankers running the show, this reduces uncertainty, which is always a good thing for bringing a new stock to market.

However, there’s a catch for the rest of us. While the review is confidential, the company must eventually make the initial submission and all subsequent updates public, but only 10 days before the stock actually starts trading. That means the public—including retail investors, financial analysts, and market watchdogs—loses access to the early, often revealing, stages of the filing process. If you’re a retail investor trying to get a handle on a hot new stock, you’re getting the full picture much later in the game than before.

Confidentiality is Locked Down

Crucially, the bill ensures that the information shared during this confidential review process is heavily protected. The SEC is legally barred from releasing any information it gathers during this pre-filing stage. The bill explicitly shields this process under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) (SEC. 2). This means that if the SEC were to have internal discussions or gather specific data points during the review that never made it into the final public filing, that information is legally protected from public disclosure. This level of protection gives companies confidence that their early drafts won't leak, but it simultaneously reduces the ability of journalists or public interest groups to monitor the SEC's initial scrutiny of these new public offerings. It's a clear win for corporate privacy, but it pulls back the curtain a little on market oversight.