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>I'll bet 1 share... I won't be your counterparty on that bet, you've already won: https://www.forbes.com/sites/saradorn/2025/09/15/trump-wants-businesses-rep

>I'll bet 1 share... I won't be your counterparty on that bet, you've already won: https://www.forbes.com/sites/saradorn/2025/09/15/trump-wants-businesses-reporting-earnings-twice-a-year-instead-of-quarterly-reports/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/saradorn/2025/09/15/trump-wants... One of the reasons cited? All the work it takes. Which is just an insane response. If your business is so poorly run and organized that reconciling things each quarter represents a disproportionate amount of effort, something is very wrong. It means you definitely don't know what's going on, because by definition you can't know, not outside those 4 times a year. In which case there's a reasonable chance the requirement to do so is the only thing that's kept it from going off the rails.

CamelCaseName 10mo ago
There's a huge difference between internal and external reporting from an effort and benefit perspective.
raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
There is a huge difference between reconciling things for your own business strategy and reconciling things in accordance with federal public company reporting standards for publicly traded companies. These standards are different than IRS reporting.
- ineedasername 10mo ago
  That doesn’t change anything: there isn’t anything in the reporting requirements that I can look at and say “that’s useless I wouldn’t want to know that about my business”
  - raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
    There are entire classes in graduate school (I am an MBA dropout) that specifically focus on Management Accounting used to make internal decisions that are different than the accounting that you have to do for public accounting. I don’t care about the GAAP depreciation guidelines when I’m deciding something if my own internal metrics show that I can get twice the useful life out of equipment
randerson 10mo ago
I rarely agree with Trump, but I'm a former exec at a public company and he's not wrong. You need a horde of lawyers and accountants and investor relations and SOX compliance people and auditors etc for the earnings reports. SOX adds burdensome processes at every layer of the organization. Your CFO and CEO will be preoccupied by earnings. It's a real disincentive for a small/medium cap company to go (or stay) public. A PE firm taking a company private can get rid of all this overhead on Day 1. Not to mention, quarterly reports incentivize a company to focus on the current quarter instead of longer-term sustainability. Reporting twice a year doesn't solve all the above problems, but it sure would reduce them a little.
- brookst 10mo ago
  Twice a year reporting also makes it easier for insiders to cash out before bad news becomes public.
  - randerson 10mo ago
    Almost all insiders file trading plans far in advance as a defense against accusations of insider trading. Twice-a-year reporting actually makes it harder for insiders because they will have to file their trading plans further in advance. And it doesn't stop shareholders from suing insiders if they believe there was actual insider trading.
    - brookst 10mo ago
      Wait, where in this proposal did you see a change in requirements around planned selling? My assumption, perhaps unfair, certainty supported by trends in US lawlessness, is that the whole scheme is to change reporting but not windows for planned sales.
- brendoelfrendo 10mo ago
  Worth noting, though, that the SOX "burden" came out of Enron and WorldCom. I'd be willing to debate the actual mechanics of the burden and see if streamlining the regulations for modern companies is possible, but I won't accept that the burden is unjustified.

CamelCaseName 10mo ago

There's a huge difference between internal and external reporting from an effort and benefit perspective.

raw_anon_1111 10mo ago

There is a huge difference between reconciling things for your own business strategy and reconciling things in accordance with federal public company reporting standards for publicly traded companies. These standards are different than IRS reporting.

ineedasername 10mo ago
That doesn’t change anything: there isn’t anything in the reporting requirements that I can look at and say “that’s useless I wouldn’t want to know that about my business”
- raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
  There are entire classes in graduate school (I am an MBA dropout) that specifically focus on Management Accounting used to make internal decisions that are different than the accounting that you have to do for public accounting. I don’t care about the GAAP depreciation guidelines when I’m deciding something if my own internal metrics show that I can get twice the useful life out of equipment

randerson 10mo ago

I rarely agree with Trump, but I'm a former exec at a public company and he's not wrong. You need a horde of lawyers and accountants and investor relations and SOX compliance people and auditors etc for the earnings reports. SOX adds burdensome processes at every layer of the organization. Your CFO and CEO will be preoccupied by earnings. It's a real disincentive for a small/medium cap company to go (or stay) public. A PE firm taking a company private can get rid of all this overhead on Day 1. Not to mention, quarterly reports incentivize a company to focus on the current quarter instead of longer-term sustainability. Reporting twice a year doesn't solve all the above problems, but it sure would reduce them a little.

brookst 10mo ago
Twice a year reporting also makes it easier for insiders to cash out before bad news becomes public.
- randerson 10mo ago
  Almost all insiders file trading plans far in advance as a defense against accusations of insider trading. Twice-a-year reporting actually makes it harder for insiders because they will have to file their trading plans further in advance. And it doesn't stop shareholders from suing insiders if they believe there was actual insider trading.
  - brookst 10mo ago
    Wait, where in this proposal did you see a change in requirements around planned selling? My assumption, perhaps unfair, certainty supported by trends in US lawlessness, is that the whole scheme is to change reporting but not windows for planned sales.
brendoelfrendo 10mo ago
Worth noting, though, that the SOX "burden" came out of Enron and WorldCom. I'd be willing to debate the actual mechanics of the burden and see if streamlining the regulations for modern companies is possible, but I won't accept that the burden is unjustified.