What company doesn’t produce monthly financial statements, let alone quarterly. I could understand this for small caps.
I also don’t see how less granularity in financials is a good thing, yes if you have bad quarter that bad (but at least you can make it up the next quarter vs a bad six months likely introduces more volatility (I think?). Also I think one of the biggest complaint is “short termism” in markets, but I hardly think that will make much of a difference.
> don’t see how less granularity in financials is a good thing
Transaction costs. Preparing this transparency costs money and attention.
As i mentioned those cost are real for small public companies, and while potentially tens of millions a year for large ones its a rounding error for them (e.g. MSFT spent ~$80m/yr on Deloitte the past couple of years for audit work, let's assume it also cost MSFT another $80m/yr on internal support for an annual cost of $160m) that would 0.15% of their net income and meaningless number in relation to the liquidity provided to the ~$3t worth of equity holders by being public. Also I'm not sure going to half year would meaning fully change that number a lot, $130m? the audit is annual with limited review of quarterly financials so there is not a ton of savings
> that would 0.15% of their net income and meaningless number in relation to the liquidity provided
It's still a distraction for leadership. While they're on a strategic pivot like the current one, quarterly reporting makes sense. If they're floating along on predictable cash flows like usual, semiannual reporting with an 8-K if something weird happens should still be fine.
Personally I'd look at this exercise as a core part of their job I don't see how reporting on the financial results of the company to its owners on a quarterly basis is a distraction. Is this a huge endeavor for the finance/legal/IR teams, yes. Does this impact the operations of the business, not a whole lot.
> don't see how reporting on the financial results of the company to its owners on a quarterly basis is a distraction
I invest in mostly private companies. I’m be pretty furious if I learned those executives spend a material part of every quarter making pretty presentations for me.
> Does this impact the operations of the business, not a whole lot
Every public-company CEO and CFO I know basically has to drop what they’re doing for a week, sometimes two, a quarter when it comes to earnings. Preparing reports and releases. Talking to big investors and bank analysts.
Of course they do - it sucks and it really sucks for the finance team (but that’s their job). But I’m 100% on board with the rest of the leadership team spending four weeks a year reporting on the results of the company to the people that actually own the company.
Having to do it more and more frequently means more and more of it gets automated.
It is not a technology problem.
The data generation is mostly automated.