What happened
Some of the hardest-hit technology and growth stocks in 2022 had some nice bounces on Thursday as the year nears a close. The holiday season can lead to some strange trading and today is no different, but this may also be an insight into what investors are looking at for 2023.
The stocks that caught my attention were Roku (ROKU 5.41%) gaining as much as 7.4% in morning trading, Block (SQ 5.04%) climbing 7.2%, and GoPro (GPRO 5.92%) gaining 3.4%. Shares of the companies were up 4.6%, 8.1%, 6%, and 2.3%, respectively, at 1:45 p.m. ET.
So what
The Nasdaq Composite is up 2.7% today on a big "risk on" trade by investors. During low-volume holiday trading, there can be big swings on very little news and while the last few days were moves to the downside, today is a big move to the upside.
One catalyst for rising stock prices was a 1.4% decline in oil prices to $77.84 in trading today. The other was a sharp drop in interest rates around the world. In the U.S., 10-year government bond yields fell 5 basis points to 3.83% and Germany, Italy, and Brazil saw 6-, 11-, and 5-basis point reductions, respectively.
Stocks have been falling all year as interest rates have gone up, so investors are looking for any sign that rates will come down, pushing stocks higher. There's a small indication of that today and that's why shares are moving higher. But this could be what's known as a "dead cat bounce," or a jump in shares that is not based on any fundamental recovery.
Now what
As much as the short-term focus may be on interest rates, investors should keep their focus on fundamental performance. You can see below that all three of these companies have had a rough time on the market this year but their financials are in very different positions. Roku is burning cash while Block and GoPro are generating positive cash flow right now.
In 2023, the market's focus is likely to turn to earnings and cash generation, even for companies that are established in their industries. That will be far more important than a few basis points on interest rates for these companies.
In the next few weeks, investors will get some clear answers as to how each company fared to end 2022. For Roku and GoPro, the important holiday quarter is nearly complete and investors will want to see positive cash flow, improving margins, and a growing installed base of users. If Block continues to add merchants to Square and consumers to the Cash App it should benefit from a growing economy.
No matter whether you like these stocks or not, today's move is noise in their long-term trajectory. Pay attention to revenue and cash flow trends because that's what will determine where these companies go in 2023.
