3Q24 Earnings Updates: Part One – IBM, TMUS, GOOG/GOOGL, META, AAPL, VICI

IBM (IBM): IBM shares sold off following a mixed report for 3Q24.  The selloff is mostly related to elevated expectations after the stock had doubled since October 2022, with over half of the gain coming since the start of 2024.  Our original purchase of IBM just over five years ago was based on an investment […]

4Q23 Earnings Updates: Part One – IBM, TMUS, and GOOG/GOOGL

International Business Machines (IBM): IBM reported a good quarter with nice upside on the all-important free cash flow.  Guidance was also good with free cash flow again surprising positively.  The stock responded very well to the earnings report, mostly because management noted another big acceleration in orders related to artificial intelligence.  As a reminder, IBM […]

3Q23 Earnings Updates: Part Two – AAPL, NXST, DIS, SONY, HD, and WMT

Apple (AAPL): AAPL 4Q23 earnings and 1Q24 guidance were mixed.  The shares are down 1% in a very strong market following the report.  4Q23 results were in line on revenue and ahead on EPS with iPhone sales holding up and Services coming in ahead.  Other hardware including Macs, iPads, and Wearables were weak.  Good cost […]

3Q23 Earnings Updates: Part One – GOOG/GOOGL, TMUS, META, IBM, and VICI

Alphabet (GOOG/GOOGL): GOOGL reported mixed results for 3Q23.  The two dominant businesses, Search and YouTube, had better-than-expected revenue growth as advertising accelerated ahead of high expectations.  On the downside, Cloud revenue grew more slowly than expected, up 22%, with management alluding to cloud spending optimization that has previously tripped up Microsoft Azure and Amazon AWS, […]

2Q23 Earnings Updates: Part Two – ATVI, AAPL, NXST, SONY, DIS, HD, and WMT

Activision Blizzard (ATVI): ATVI reported strong 2Q23 results well ahead of analyst consensus.  A good launch for the latest Diablo game, ongoing strength in King mobile games, and steady results for Call of Duty and World of Warcraft led to the positive quarter.  Analyst estimates moved up for 2023 but less for 2024.  The more […]

2Q23 Earnings Updates: Part One – IBM, GOOG/GOOGL, META, VICI, TMUS

IBM (IBM): IBM reported an inline quarter with the normal give and take that any large, diversified corporation will experience.  All guidance was reiterated with a slight boost to the growth rate for software revenue.  Software was a little better than expected driven by double-digit growth at Red Hat for hybrid cloud and transaction processing […]

Bard Does Northlake 1Q23 Earnings Updates: Part Two – DIS, NXST, VICI, HD, and WMT

So far, we have found using Bard GAI to help analyze earnings report to be insightful and fun.  Insightful to discover more about the capabilities and shortfalls of GAI and fun to try something different.  Several more companies have reported since our last update, and we decided to stick with the same format for Part […]

Bard Does Northlake 1Q23 Earnings Updates: Part One – IBM, GOOG, ATVI, META, TMUS, and SONY

Given the excitement surrounding Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) since Microsoft and OpenAI released ChatGPT to the public in November, we thought it would be educational, interesting, and fun to let GAI write our regular quarterly earnings updates.  ChatGPT only has data through 2021, so we are using Google’s GAI app, Bard. Kind of fun to […]

4Q22 Earnings Updates:  Part Three – WMT, HD, VICI and NXST

Walmart (WMT): When we purchased WMT as a new long-term investment last June, our thesis was built on the idea that the stock offered both offensive and defensive characteristics.  The defensive characteristics were important with the economy and market in an uncertain period amid high inflation and the Fed’s aggressive monetary policy tightening to slow […]

4Q22 Earnings Updates: Part Two – SONY, META, AAPL, GOOG/GOOGL, ATVI and DIS

SONY Corporation (SONY): SONY reported a good quarter with modest beats on operating income driven by profit margins.  The company passed through a portion of the beat to its full-year operating income forecast.  Often companies that only pass through a portion of an earnings beat are penalized, but that usually does not apply to SONY […]