How earnings season could truly 'surprise' 😮

When everyone's expecting better-than-expected earnings 🤔

First quarter earnings season is kicking off, which means many large publicly traded corporations will soon announce financial results for the first three months of 2024. They’ll also provide guidance for what they believe is to come in the next few quarters.

According to FactSet, analysts expect S&P 500 companies to report 3.2% earnings per share (EPS) growth.

As these earnings headlines cross, we’ll hear a lot about whether companies “surprised” analysts by beating or missing earnings expectations.

But what does it really mean to surprise?