I had a little bit of a flashback final evening to the 12 months 2000, sitting in my workplace after hours watching JDS Uniphase collapse on the heels of its convention name after reporting “higher than anticipated” earnings for the quarter. All through 2000, techs and telecoms had been nonetheless making a ton of revenue, nevertheless it was turning into obvious that they had been nonetheless coasting on the spend from 1999. And that the atmosphere was altering. So you’ll see a breathless 4pm “print” with a greater than anticipated EPS and income quantity, however then administration would get on the convention name and inform you that the outlook was deteriorating.
Firm after firm did the identical factor. Top quality or low high quality agency, it didn’t matter. Everybody was affected, from the blue chips like Cisco to the trashbags like Nortel. It didn’t matter. And so the mantra grew to become “Ignore the numbers, anticipate the decision.”
That is precisely what final evening felt like, with the primary of the mega cap tech giants reporting. Microsoft’s earnings had been nice. Their outlook confirms the necessity for his or her having let go of 10,000 staff in latest days. The atmosphere is altering. In the course of the pandemic they pulled ahead three years price of demand into one. Enterprise tech spend exploded. Shopper tech demand exploded. The tempo was by no means going to be sustainable. Now we pay for that pull-forward. The inventory worth has already paid for it, however not essentially in full.
This earnings season, firms in know-how and different development areas of the financial system are all going to be singing an analogous tune. Issues are good proper now however the future is rising extra unsure by the day. My finest guess is that cautious tones on convention calls would be the norm, not the exception. For those who had been the CEO or CFO of a Fortune 500 firm, why wouldn’t you venture warning proper now? What can be the benefit of telegraphing the rest headed into an apparent slowing of demand for just about the whole lot?
Michael and I talked about Microsoft’s report and the present state of issues final evening through the dwell premiere of What Are Your Ideas, which has been watched by over 20,000 viewers to date. For those who missed it, test it out under:
