Since 1970, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has required U.S. public companies to provide financial updates every three months through quarterly earnings reports. The 55-year-old tradition may soon be cut in half under the Trump administration, which is looking to shift to semi-annual reporting. The proposal drew both praise and criticism from some of Wall Street’s most influential leaders.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon expressed support for President Trump’s proposal in an interview with Bloomberg TV yesterday (October 7). “I welcome that,” he said, noting that quarterly forecasts put “CEOs in a difficult position.” “They have to meet these requirements – revenue – and then they start doing stupid things,” he added.
Trump proposed the proposal last month, arguing that reporting earnings every six months instead of three would “save money and allow managers to focus on running the company right.” The president previously pushed for similar changes during his first term in 2018, when the SEC solicited public feedback but ultimately retained the quarterly requirement.
This time, however, the SEC appears more willing to take action. The agency said the proposal would be a priority, with SEC Chairman Paul Atkins calling the president’s request “timely” and that the SEC was “working to expedite the process.” Atkins said a draft proposal could be released in the coming months.
Dimon said JPMorgan will still report earnings on a quarterly basis, but with “much less content.” He described the requirement as part of a larger problem of “endless rules” that make it harder for companies to go public. “We’ve gone from 8,000 listed companies in 1996 to 4,000 today,” he told Bloomberg. “You want an active market and we’ve crushed that.”
Dimon isn’t the only one supporting this potential shift. Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman praised Trump’s proposal after it was announced, arguing that quarterly reports encourage “short-termism” — an excessive focus on immediate results. In a LinkedIn post, she called for “common-sense reforms to ease the burden on public companies.”
How Finance Leaders View Quarterly Reports
Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said the benefits of semi-annual reporting are clear. He said in a speech at Georgetown University last month that fewer earnings reports would free up time for companies and allow executives to take a long-term view. “As CEO, I would obviously rather have two earnings calls a year than four earnings calls a year,” he said.
Still, Solomon acknowledged that eliminating quarterly reporting could reduce transparency. “I’m still thinking about it and the company is still thinking about it,” he added, noting that he has not yet decided whether to support the change.
However, Citadel CEO Ken Griffin has made up his mind. “I don’t see the benefit of withholding information that is readily available to the market,” he told CNBC in September, warning that accountability could suffer if longer gaps between reports are allowed. “In this day and age, quarterly reporting is fair game,” Griffin added. Griffin agreed with Dimon that excessive regulation can hinder initial public offerings and said barriers to expanding the number of companies listed should be addressed.
This isn’t the first time finance leaders have questioned the quarterly reporting model. In 2018, Dimon and Warren Buffett co-wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed urging companies to lower or cancel quarterly profit forecasts. Such forecasts, they argue, prompt companies to think short-term and prevent those with long-term goals from going public. “Our views on quarterly earnings forecasts should not be misconstrued as an objection to quarterly and annual reporting,” Dimon and Buffett wrote, insisting that transparency remains “an important aspect of U.S. public markets.”
