By Saeed Azhar and Manya Saini
April 14 (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase on Tuesday backed a Trump administration proposal to end mandatory quarterly reporting, with Chief Financial Officer Jeremy Barnum supporting efforts to ease regulatory burdens and bolster U.S. capital markets.
President Donald Trump has argued that the move, first proposed by him in 2018, would cut costs and discourage shortsightedness among publicly traded companies.
"We're very supportive of all initiatives and any initiatives that
lessen the burden to ensure that U.S.-listed markets remain maximally robust," Barnum told reporters on a post-earnings call.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is preparing a proposal to scrap the requirement and give companies the option to share results twice a year, the Wall Street Journal reported last month, citing sources.
The debate over quarterly reporting reflects a broader push in Washington and on Wall Street to rethink disclosure rules that have long shaped how companies communicate with investors. Several top corporate executives, including Tesla chief Elon Musk and JPMorgan's CEO Jamie Dimon, have voiced support for the move.
Still, they said there is a benefit in keeping regular communications with shareholders.
"A thing that is not widely understood is that actually earnings calls, like the one that we're doing today, are actually not required by the SEC. People do them because they want to communicate (with the) market," Barnum said.
He added that the bank would continue to host such calls for analysts and investors even in a new regime.
Supporters of the change say easing reporting requirements could shift the focus away from short-term earnings pressure, give executives more room to invest for the long term, and bring U.S. markets closer to global peers that follow half-year reporting.
Opponents, however, caution that any rollback risks reducing transparency and could leave investors with less timely insight into corporate performance at a time of heightened market uncertainty.
"This (the end of quarterly reporting) winds up being mostly about the frequency with which you need to release the 10-Q and the amount of content in the 10-Q," Barnum said.
"We can imagine streamlining that a little bit in line with feedback from investors about what they actually find useful."
A 10-Q filing is a bulky quarterly report that U.S.-listed companies must submit to the U.S. SEC, detailing their financial performance, risks and key business updates.
(Reporting by Manya Saini in Bengaluru and Saeed Azhar in New York; Editing by Megan Davies and Anil D'Silva)
