Wall Street has spent the week bracing for a number, and the nervousness is not really about whether Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) made money. It is about whether making an extraordinary amount of it is still enough.
GOOGL stock is moving ahead of earnings. See the chart and price action here.
When the Google parent reports second-quarter results after Wednesday’s close, investors will be studying a company that occupies a strange position: fabulously cash-rich, and yet visibly stretched by the scale of its own ambitions.
The financial newsletter Swiss Transparent Portfolio, in a preview published this week, put the paradox at the center of the moment.
“The most self-funding company on earth passed the hat,” the publication wrote. “That is the tension the market brings to Wednesday’s print.”
