Earnings season is fully underway now, and today I want to focus on what actually matters over the coming week. We’ve already had some heavy hitters reporting, most notably large banks like JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and Citi. Overall, results were solid, with beats across the board.
One of my more recent holdings, BlackRock, also reported earlier this week. There was nothing out of the ordinary, just a strong quarter as expected, and the stock rebounded sharply, which puts my position roughly 10% in the green. The stock had been caught between private credit fears and a possible global energy crisis, but this latest report has reminded investors, once again, of the business’ strength. However, next week is where things get even more interesting for me personally.
The key question is how the so-called “SaaSpocalypse” will actually show up in the numbers. So far, even the seemingly most vulnerable platforms like Adobe are still delivering consistent growth with no real signs of weakness. Let’s see if that can continue, or if the “AI kills software” narrative survives another round.
Big names reporting next week include ServiceNow, Salesforce and SAP, all of which are deeply integrated ecosystems that keep multi-billion-dollar companies running. So as a shareholder, I wouldn’t worry too much. I actually considered adding to my already considerable ServiceNow position at $80, but before I could, the stock spiked again. Better luck next time, I guess.
Another area worth watching next week are brokers and exchanges like IBKR, CME and Nasdaq, which should give a fairly clean read on market activity. And of course, the “real” economy will be a major factor as well. Companies like General Electric, Boeing and D.R. Horton should give a better indication of how things are actually holding up, beyond what certain figures in the White House would like people to believe.
That’s the outlook for the early stages of this current earnings season. The most important reports, especially the ones I’m personally exposed to, will come later in the cycle and I’ll cover those separately.
On a more personal note, and don’t take this too seriously though, there is one company where I wouldn’t mind seeing a bad quarter, and that’s Intuitive Surgical. For a very simple reason: I want to buy it, but the valuation is still at exorbitant levels. Quite similar to Axon actually.
$JPM (-1,19%)
$GS (-0,59%)
$C (-0,46%)
$BLK (-1,06%)
$CRM (+1,83%)
$NOW (+4,85%)
$SAP (+1,3%)
$IBKR (+1,15%)
$CME (-0,53%)
$NDAQ (+3,23%)
$GE (+0,7%)
$BA (-0,79%)
$DHI (-2,57%)
$ISRG (+0,63%)
$AXON (+1,12%)