Last Friday, shares sank 9% after they reported. Their Q1 looked good to him, though, with a huge subscriber beat (adding 9.33 million paid users) and revenue jumped 15% YOY. $2.14 billion cash flow was impressive, and the company offered great guidance for the next quarter. That said, the full-year revenue growth forecast seemed lacking, slightly below expectations, and management didn't raise its full-year free cash flow forecast. This suggests things will be worse in the second half of 2024. Also, they're getting hit by currency fluctuations, like the collapse of Argentina's peso. But starting next year, Netflix won't supply numbers about membership and average revenue per member, which really spooked the market and triggered the sell-off. He agrees that they revenues mean more now with the company, but it was a boneheaded move to hide this data. Overall, he's more bullish than bearish about Netflix. Memberships are up and their ad business is growing.
Analysts are looking forward to the developers' conference in June and the iPhone launch in September, but who knows if shares can take off without an AI tie-in? He suspects analysts are buying as estimates are cut, but interest will remain tepid until Apple shows that global growth is accelerating as much as it's shrinking in China, and that services revenues are holding. They make great products and now trades at a PE lower than what we're used to. They make a lot of money, but doesn't grow as fast as we'd like (or is not growing). If you think there won't be an iPhone refresh, then this is a sell down to $120, but he expects another refresh, but institutions won't let Apple fall that low. Buy a tranche at $160 then add even more if it falls down to $130. The longs will make a stand based on next year's earnings.
Peak of earnings season this week - earnings are tracking higher than consensus (concentrated in large tech names). Geopolitical risk, and interest rates main concern for falling markets last week. Rising cost of money (potentially) is concerning for investors. Without "Mag 7" names - not much earnings growth in markets. Energy companies performing well, but broader markets not as strong.
Shares have tanked lately, because bond yields have been soaring as the market realizes that the Fed will cut rates later and perhaps less frequently. The March 8, non-farm payroll reports was lot hotter than expected, signaling a stronger employment market.