There are many ways to approach General Electric (NYSE: GE) but the only one is to remember that you are on a blind date.
Revenues forecasts, profitability targets, projections and price targets from analysts have all changed so swiftly in the past nine months that current shareholders are lucky to have recorded only a 25% paper loss year to date.
This is a topic that goes to the heart of what managing expectations means in finance, and why execution is a completely different matter. And, quite simply, GE has not had the time to reach that point during the year in which earnings, and subsequently core operating cash flows, rise at a much faster clip than in the first half.
