Rolling EPS

Wall Street sorta lives "a quarter behind, a quarter ahead; a year behind, a year ahead."

WDTM? Well, it means that whatever the company did last quarter is often the base case for growth off whatever they print this quarter. P/E or Price-to-Something multiples then get attached, and the Street prices the stock. So Rolling Earnings Per Share matter, in that whatever earnings the company printed 5 quarters ago falls off into oblivion, i.e. we don't care about that number anymore. Say EPS was like...$0.15, $0.20, $0.25, $0.30, $0.35, and then $0.40 (conveniently all a nickel better in sequential quarters). If we just printed that 40-cent number, our rolling trailing EPS was $1.30. If next quarter we print 45 cents, then we lose the 25-cent quarter and our trailing 4 quarter EPS then becomes $1.50.

Rolling. Like the pit of your stomach, waiting for that earnings number to print.