Trump admin proposes letting companies report earnings only twice a year

The Securities and Exchange Commission, the nation’s top regulator for publicly traded companies, issued a proposal Tuesday that would give companies the option to report their earnings and financials only twice per year.

Under current SEC rules, in place since the 1970s, companies are required to report earnings after each quarter and annually.

“Public companies have an obligation under the federal securities laws to provide information that is material to investors,” SEC Chairman Paul Atkins said in a statement. “Yet, the rigidity of the SEC’s rules has prevented companies and their investors from determining for themselves the interim reporting frequency that best serves their business needs and investors.”

“Today’s proposed amendments, if ultimately adopted, would provide companies with increased regulatory flexibility in this regard,” he said.

President Donald Trump has urged such a change.

“Subject to SEC Approval, Companies and Corporations should no longer be forced to ‘Report’ on a quarterly basis,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in September. “This will save money, and allow managers to focus on properly running their companies.”

Trump added: “Did you ever hear the statement that, ‘China has a 50 to 100 year view on management of a company, whereas we run our companies on a quarterly basis???’ Not good!!!”

Atkins quickly vowed to fast-track the idea.

When the idea was most recently put forward in 2018, it never gathered enough steam to become reality. This time is likely different, though, as Trump himself has repeatedly pushed the idea.

Already, some public companies in Europe follow a semiannual reporting schedule.

But opponents of loosening the quarterly reporting rules say that U.S. capital markets have flourished because of the frequency and transparency of information from companies.

“I don’t understand the merits of holding back from the market readily knowable information,” Citadel founder and billionaire investor Ken Griffin told CNBC in September.

Griffin has said that he voted for Trump. He has also been a major donor to Republican politicians.

“Corporate executives should be held accountable for providing fair and reasonable disclosure on a periodic basis so people can value their businesses and hold leadership accountable,” Griffin added. “And I think, in this day and age, I think quarterly reporting is fair.”

Griffin also warned about the pitfalls of moving to fewer financial reports.

“If you go to a longer period between reporting, I think you risk losing some level of accountability and I think that you lose a level of transparency in the marketplace,” he said. “And with that, there’s a likely increase in cost of capital.”

SEC rules do not require that companies hold earnings calls or issue earnings forecasts. However, most do in order to give investors and the public as much information as possible.

“As a CEO, I’d obviously rather do two earnings calls a year than four earnings calls a year,” Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said in an interview in 2025. But, at the time, Solomon said he had not decided if it was a good idea in practice.

“I’m still thinking it through and the firm’s still thinking it through,” he said.

In October, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said, “I would welcome it,” when asked about the possible changes.

JPMorgan would likely still update investors quarterly, Dimon said on Bloomberg TV, but “with much less stuff.”

Other proponents of the change have said it could save companies time and money compiling financial statements and organizing the earnings releases.

If a company would like to switch to semiannual reporting from quarterly reporting, firms would need to check a box on their next 10-K annual filing to signal the switch, SEC officials said.

Companies would only be able to switch annually, and not go back and forth during the year.

The SEC will soon open a 60-day window for public feedback on the proposal before moving forward.

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