Apple reports earnings this week. So do a bunch of other companies worth more than most countries. The market cares deeply about this. Retail traders care even more, which is how you know it doesn't matter.
This is the busiest week of earnings season. That's what happens when you let all the important companies report at once instead of spacing them out like a functional system. But we're not a functional system. We're a casino that occasionally remembers to file paperwork.
The summary says this comes at a critical juncture for the broader stock market. Every juncture is critical when you write headlines for a living. Last Tuesday was critical. Next Thursday will be critical. The word lost meaning sometime around 2009 and never recovered.
Megacaps lead the week. That means the five companies propping up the entire index will tell you their quarterly revenue, and analysts will pretend the numbers matter more than the multiple everyone already agreed to pay. Apple could report they spent $90 billion on a giant foam finger and the stock would gap up 3% because the foam finger beat expectations.
Retail traders are refreshing their brokerage apps right now, preparing to buy calls on whatever moves first. They will not read the earnings report. They will not listen to the call. They will see a green candle and assume it's a message from God. Then they'll watch it reverse and blame market manipulation, as if someone manipulated them into being stupid.
Second-quarter earnings season. The quarter ended six weeks ago, but we're just now hearing about it because accounting takes time and theatrics take longer. CEOs need at least a month to rehearse their confidence voice and practice saying "prudent capital allocation" without laughing.
The charts don't care what Tim Cook says on Tuesday. Neither should you. But you will anyway, because reading earnings transcripts feels like research even when it's just expensive horoscopes.
Photo by James Yarema on Unsplash
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