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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown! Today we're digging into McDonald's second quarter 2026 results, and there's a lot to unpack — some real strategic news alongside a leadership change. Before we get into it, quick note: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Yeah, and this one's juicy, Alex — because it's not the usual "everything's great" call. McDonald's actually came out and said, in Chris Kempczinski's words, "we don't have a strategy problem, we simply didn't execute."

ALEX: Right, so let's start with the numbers. Systemwide sales grew 4% in constant currency, global comparable sales up 1.3%. Adjusted EPS came in at $3.38, up 5% on a constant currency basis. Solid, but not spectacular.

JORDAN: And the real story is the U.S. — comp sales grew just 0.8% in the quarter, which was below expectations. International actually carried the day here, with IOM up 1.5% and the international developmental licensed markets up 1.9%, led by Japan posting its tenth straight quarter of positive guest counts.

ALEX: So what actually went wrong in the U.S.? CFO Ian Borden broke it into pieces. They launched this new "everyday affordable price" menu — 10 items under $3 — in late April, but execution was spotty. Only about 60 to 65% of restaurants actually followed the recommended pricing.

JORDAN: And here's the kicker — to fund that value push, they pulled back on digital offers and killed the Buy One, Add One for a dollar promotion, which apparently really annoyed their most loyal, high-frequency customers. Kempczinski flat-out called it "a bad trade."

ALEX: Management said that alone accounted for about two-thirds of the traffic miss. The rest came down to their FIFA-themed marketing campaign in June underperforming expectations.

JORDAN: There was also this operational overload problem — Chris painted a great picture of it, basically saying "put yourself in a restaurant manager's shoes." You've got K-Pop Demon Hunters merchandise going up, then three weeks later you're flipping the value menu, then a brand-new beverage platform launches, then FIFA. Crew members are getting whiplash, service times went up, satisfaction scores went down.

ALEX: It's a good reminder that even a company with McDonald's scale and marketing muscle can trip over its own to-do list. Too much "new" at once, poorly sequenced.

JORDAN: Right, and it bled into July too — Borden mentioned U.S. comps were actually slightly negative to start Q3. So this isn't fully behind them yet.

ALEX: Now here's where it gets interesting — there's a leadership shakeup. Skye Anderson, previously COO of McDonald's USA, is stepping in as the new President of McDonald's U.S., effective immediately. Joe Erlinger, who ran the U.S. business for nearly seven years, is leaving the company.

JORDAN: Chris was pretty deliberate about framing this as a planned transition, not a panic move — he name-checked Anderson's 26-year track record, including a stint leading the U.S. West zone where she drove over 30% comp sales growth. But the timing, right after a rough quarter, is obviously going to raise eyebrows.

ALEX: On the brighter side — beverages. McDonald's launched a new beverage platform in the U.S., Canada, and Germany in May, and early results are beating expectations. Higher checks, strong food attachment, and more than half the traffic is coming after the lunch rush — which is exactly the low-volume window they want to fill.

JORDAN: They're also leaning into Red Bull Energizers rolling out in the U.S. soon, and Australia just launched the platform in mid-July. This seems like a l

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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown! Today we're diving into Mastercard's second quarter 2026 results, and there's a lot to unpack — big numbers, a leadership shakeup, and some fascinating moves into AI-driven commerce.

JORDAN: Yeah, this one's got a bit of everything. But before we get into it —

ALEX: Right, quick disclaimer: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good, now let's get into it. Mastercard posted net revenue up 12% year-over-year, adjusted net income up 16%, and EPS of $5.04. That's a strong quarter, and honestly it came in above what management was expecting.

ALEX: It really did. And one number that jumped out to me — value-added services, that's all the fraud, security, and consulting stuff Mastercard layers on top of its payments network — grew 18%. That's outpacing the core payments business by a good margin.

JORDAN: Which tells you where the growth engine really is right now. Gross dollar volume worldwide was up 8%, cross-border volume up 12%, and switched transactions — that's transactions actually processed on Mastercard's network — grew 9%. All pretty healthy.

ALEX: Let's talk about the elephant in the room first, though: the leadership transition. This was CFO Sachin Mehra's last earnings call in that role — he's moving to a new position as Chief Business Officer. Ling Hai, who's been running the Asia Pacific, Europe, Middle East and Africa region, steps in as CFO starting August 3rd.

JORDAN: It was a pretty warm moment on the call, honestly. CEO Michael Miebach thanked Mehra for seven-plus years in the seat, and Mehra himself got a little sentimental, thanking analysts and investors for the relationship. Ling Hai even said he's looking forward to "leading the next earnings call."

ALEX: Smooth transition, no red flags — just feels like normal succession planning at a company that's performing well.

JORDAN: Agreed. Now, strategically, there were a few things I found really interesting. First, this switching technology partnership in the UAE. Mastercard is now building out the actual domestic payments switching infrastructure for the Central Bank of the UAE, working alongside their local scheme called Jaywan.

ALEX: Which is a bit of a shift, right? Normally we think of Mastercard as just the network sitting on top of transactions. Here they're actually building and operating switching infrastructure locally.

JORDAN: Exactly — Miebach called it "run anything anywhere," a strategy they've been building since 2022. They've done something similar in South Africa, and they're clearly eyeing this modular approach as a way to get access to transaction volume they wouldn't otherwise touch — even domestic transactions that don't run through Mastercard's global switch.

ALEX: There's also a Latin America push — expanding their Alipay+ partnership into Mexico with Clip, a fintech with a huge merchant network. Remember, Mexico is a market where over 70% of consumer payments are still cash-based, so there's a massive digitization opportunity there.

JORDAN: And speaking of frontier stuff — Mastercard rolled out something called Agent Pay for Machines. This is genuinely new territory: it's designed to let AI agents autonomously pay for things like API calls, cloud compute, or data access, at machine speed, with over 30 partners already signed on including Coinbase, Cloudflare, and Checkout.com.

ALEX: This is the "agentic commerce" trend everyone's talking about. Miebach made an interesting distinction on the call — consumer and B2B agent-driven purchases can basically run through existing card rails just fine, but this true machine-to-machine, micro-transaction world is a genuinely new category, and Mast

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I'll write the podcast script now based on the transcript.

WELCOME TO BETA FINCH, YOUR AI-POWERED EARNINGS BREAKDOWN

ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. I'm Alex, joined as always by Jordan, and today we're digging into Lowe's second quarter fiscal 2026 results, reported August 19th. Before we get into it — this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good disclaimer to lead with, because this quarter has a little bit of everything — solid execution undercut by some messy competitive dynamics. Should be a fun one to unpack.

ALEX: Let's start with the topline. Lowe's did $26 billion in sales for the quarter, up 8.3% year-over-year, but that growth is mostly acquisition-driven — comparable sales, meaning existing stores, only rose 0.2%. GAAP diluted EPS came in at $4.27, and adjusted EPS was $4.40, which included an $0.11 benefit from tariff refunds.

JORDAN: And that $0.11 detail matters more than it sounds like at first. CFO Brandon Sink was clear that even excluding the tariff refund, adjusted EPS beat expectations. So the underlying business performed better than the headline number suggests — that refund wasn't propping up an otherwise weak quarter.

ALEX: Right, and comp sales broke down interestingly by month — May was down 0.4%, June up 1.7%, July down 1.2%. Some of that swing is just calendar noise, the July 4th holiday shifted between June and July and moved about 75 basis points back and forth.

JORDAN: But the more important July story wasn't calendar — it was competitive. Management said competitors used their own tariff refund dollars to slash prices, particularly in seasonal categories like grills, patio furniture, and live goods. Lowe's chose not to chase those promotions.

ALEX: Yeah, CEO Marvin Ellison was pretty blunt about that in the Q&A — he said matching those prices "was not in our financial plan" and wasn't "financially prudent." Basically: we can see who got tariff refunds by looking at whose gross margin cratered.

JORDAN: Which is a pretty sharp comment aimed squarely at competitors. But it also tells you something about Lowe's discipline here — they'd rather protect margin than chase a short-term share number in a category they view as transitory. Whether that's the right call long-term is the real debate for investors.

ALEX: Let's talk about where the strength actually showed up, because it wasn't uniform. Lowe's has been leaning hard into what they call the "Total Home" strategy — basically diversifying beyond the DIY homeowner into professional contractors, online, and installed services.

JORDAN: And that strategy is clearly doing the heavy lifting. Online sales grew nearly 16% — that's back-to-back quarters above 15%. Pro customers kept growing too, especially small and medium-sized contractors. Home Services, the "do it for me" installation business, also grew. Meanwhile, discretionary DIY spending — think big remodeling projects — stayed under pressure.

ALEX: One thing that jumped out to me was Mylow, their AI shopping assistant. They said it's fielded over 25 million questions from customers and store associates combined, and customers who use it convert at three times the rate of those who don't.

JORDAN: That's a genuinely strong stat. It's early days for how much AI tools move the needle in retail, but a 3x conversion lift is not a rounding error — that's a real behavioral signal. Worth watching whether that holds up as adoption scales further.

ALEX: On the Pro side, they've been building out FBM and ADG — Foundation Building Materials and Artisan Design Group, two acquisitions aimed at bigger professional and construction customers

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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown! Today we're digging into Eli Lilly's Q2 2026 results, and Jordan, I'll just say it up front — this was a big one.

JORDAN: Big is an understatement. But before we get into the numbers, our standard reminder: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

ALEX: Right, with that said — let's talk numbers. Lilly's revenue grew 48% year-over-year in Q2. Their key products alone added almost $6.8 billion, and get this — oncology, immunology, and neuroscience combined grew 121% versus last year.

JORDAN: That's a company firing on basically every cylinder. And the incretin franchise — Zepbound and Mounjaro — is still the engine room. Combined, those two brought in $14.9 billion in the quarter, contributing $6.3 billion of the total growth.

ALEX: Gross margin ticked up to 86.3%, non-GAAP EPS came in at $8.38 — though that includes a $3.03 hit from acquired R&D charges, so the underlying number is even stronger. And naturally, they raised full-year guidance: revenue now expected between $85 and $87 billion.

JORDAN: Which, by the way, is up $3 billion at the low end and $2 billion at the high end from prior guidance. That's not a small tweak — that's a company that's genuinely outperforming its own expectations.

ALEX: Let's talk geography for a second, because the international story here is wild. China revenue grew 93% in constant currency. Rest of world — think Latin America, Asia — grew 136%. Lilly's international incretin market share is now around 55% globally.

JORDAN: And this is the piece I think investors sometimes underweight — Mounjaro's global rollout is still in relatively early innings in a lot of these markets. Management basically said future growth outside the U.S. is going to come from market penetration, not just new country launches, since most of the big launch wave already happened last year.

ALEX: Which actually ties into one of the more interesting analyst questions on the call — someone pushed back on guidance, basically asking "wait, doesn't this guide imply deceleration versus Q2?" And CFO Lucas Montarce had a pretty candid answer.

JORDAN: Yeah, he pointed to a few real factors — there were some one-time favorable adjustments to rebate and discount estimates this quarter that won't repeat, last year's back half had a huge bolus of new-market Mounjaro launches that's now lapped, and there's normal seasonality — European summer holidays hit Q3, and diabetes has its own seasonal pattern in Q4. So it's less "conservative sandbagging" and more "the comp gets harder."

ALEX: Fair enough. Now let's talk about the newer story here — Foundayo, their oral GLP-1. The U.S. launch has been a bit of a slow burn, but management said they're now seeing real inflection. Prescriber count went from 8,000 last quarter to 36,000 now, and the last week of July nearly doubled monthly volume.

JORDAN: The Medicare GLP-1 Bridge Program is a big deal too — it launched July 1st and gives 20 million eligible Americans coverage for obesity GLP-1s at just $50 a month out-of-pocket. That's a 35% expansion in coverage overnight. Early signs are heavily skewed toward injectables — about 80% — but they're seeing real new-patient uptake on both fronts.

ALEX: And internationally, the UAE numbers turned heads — $31 million in Foundayo sales in a single quarter, which is nearly half of total U.S. sales. One analyst flagged that as a signal of "explosive potential" once Foundayo rolls out more broadly, which management confirmed is coming mostly in 2027.

JORDAN: On the pipeline side, retatrutide is the one to watch. Three positive Phase III trials — TRIUMPH-1, 2,

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**BETA FINCH — HOME DEPOT (HD) Q2 FISCAL 2026 EARNINGS BREAKDOWN**

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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. I'm Alex, joined as always by Jordan. Today we're digging into Home Depot's second quarter fiscal 2026 results, reported August 18th.

JORDAN: Good one to cover — there's a lot going on here beyond the headline numbers.

ALEX: There is. But before we get into it, quick disclaimer: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good to have that out of the way. So, Alex, where do we start?

ALEX: Let's start with the top line. Home Depot posted $47.9 billion in sales for the quarter, up 5.7% year-over-year. Comp sales — that's sales at stores open at least a year — grew 1.7% company-wide, with U.S. comps up 1.3%. Adjusted diluted EPS came in at $4.92, versus $4.68 a year ago.

JORDAN: And importantly, management said results actually exceeded their own internal expectations. That's notable in this environment — housing turnover is sitting at historic lows, and big discretionary remodels are still under pressure. So beating expectations here is really a story about smaller projects.

ALEX: Right, this was very much a "repair and maintenance" quarter. Think storage, electrical, hardware, plumbing — 13 of their 16 merchandising departments posted positive comps. Big, expensive kitchen and bath remodels? Still soft. But the bread-and-butter stuff is holding up well.

JORDAN: What stood out to me is the ticket versus transaction split. Average ticket was up 2.8%, but transactions were actually down 1%. So people are spending more per visit, but fewer people are walking through the door. Big-ticket purchases over $1,000 were up 2.4%, which tells you there's still some appetite for larger single-item purchases — think appliances, portable power tools — even if it's not full-blown renovation spending.

ALEX: Speaking of portable power, Billy Bastek, their merchandising EVP, called Q2 a record-setting quarter for portable power tools. That's been a real bright spot along with patio and, interestingly, appliances — where they've built out next-day delivery to nearly 60% of the population.

JORDAN: Let's talk about the tariff piece, because this got a lot of analyst attention on the call. Home Depot received $730 million in IEEPA tariff refunds during the quarter, and $685 million of that flowed through to reduce cost of goods sold. That gave gross margin a roughly 145 basis point lift.

ALEX: But — and this is the important nuance — that benefit was mostly offset by rising costs elsewhere. About 60 basis points of pressure from fuel, energy, and other input costs, plus another 60 basis points of margin dilution just from the mix effect of the GMS acquisition. Net-net, gross margin only rose about 25 basis points to 33.7%.

JORDAN: CFO Richard McPhail was pretty direct about this — he said even without the tariff refund, they'd have beaten expectations anyway, it just would've shown up differently. He's basically pre-empting the narrative that Home Depot "missed" underlying profitability and needed the refund to bail them out.

ALEX: Which makes sense given how the stock commentary was framing it going into the call. Now, strategically, the two big themes this quarter were the Pro customer and interconnected retail — meaning online, delivery, in-store tech all working together.

JORDAN: The Pro business had a positive comp and actually outperformed DIY, which is a real accomplishment given how much of the housing market is frozen right now. A lot of that comes down to SRS Distribution and the GMS acquisition — those are the specialty distributors Home Depot has folded in to better s

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**WELCOME TO BETA FINCH: HOME DEPOT Q2 2026**

ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. I'm Alex, joined as always by Jordan, and today we're digging into Home Depot's second quarter fiscal 2026 numbers. Big one — the world's largest home improvement retailer, a lot of moving pieces this quarter.

JORDAN: Lots to get into, including some tariff refund math that tripped up a few analysts on the call.

ALEX: We'll get there. But first, the standard disclosure: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good to have that on record. So, headline numbers — Home Depot posted $47.9 billion in sales, up 5.7% year-over-year. Comp sales up 1.7% overall, 1.3% in the U.S. specifically.

ALEX: And adjusted diluted EPS came in at $4.92, versus $4.68 a year ago. That actually beat expectations — management said the quarter exceeded what they'd planned for.

JORDAN: Worth noting right up top — before the numbers, CFO Richard McPhail addressed CEO Ted Decker's temporary medical leave of absence. Leadership wished him a quick recovery and said Ann-Marie Campbell and the broader team are steering the ship in the meantime.

ALEX: Good context to have. Now let's talk about what actually drove the quarter, because it's a broader story than just "big box retailer sells more stuff." Thirteen of sixteen merchandising departments posted positive comps — storage, electrical, hardware, power tools, plumbing, paint, flooring, you name it.

JORDAN: And it wasn't just seasonal stuff either. Merchandising EVP Billy Bastek made a point of saying only 3 of their top 20 performing categories were seasonal — the "middle of the store," as he called it, core home improvement categories, is where the real strength showed up.

ALEX: Portable power was a standout — Q2 was literally a record-setting quarter for portable power tools. And Pro customers outperformed DIY again, continuing a trend we've heard from Home Depot for a while now.

JORDAN: The Pro story is interesting because it's not just one thing — it's an ecosystem play. QuoteCenter, the SRS acquisition, GMS, purchase cards — they're stitching all of this together so a Pro can basically source everything through the Home Depot family instead of shopping around. Ann-Marie Campbell said 90% of stores closed a sale through SRS's catalog in the last 12 months.

ALEX: That's a real flywheel if it keeps compounding. And on the digital side — online comp sales grew 11%, the fifth straight quarter of double-digit growth. They also launched Express Delivery nationwide this month — three-hour delivery on tens of thousands of products, with most actually arriving in under an hour.

JORDAN: That's a meaningful shift. Delivery lead times are down about 45% over the last 18 months. For a company built on people driving to an orange box store, leaning this hard into fast delivery — including big and bulky items and even next-day appliance delivery in some markets — signals they're taking the fight to online-only competitors pretty seriously.

ALEX: Now, let's talk about the part of the call that generated the most back-and-forth — gross margin and tariffs.

JORDAN: Right, so this is the one investors were parsing closely. Home Depot received $730 million in IEEPA tariff refunds this quarter, and $685 million of that flowed through and reduced cost of goods sold. That gave gross margin a roughly 145 basis point boost.

ALEX: But — and this is the nuance — that benefit was largely offset by rising costs elsewhere. About 60 basis points of pressure from fuel, energy, and other input costs, plus another 60 basis points from a mix shift tied to the GMS acquisition. Net-net, gross

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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown! Today we're diving into Gilead Sciences' second quarter 2026 results — and Jordan, this is a big one.

JORDAN: It really is. Big numbers, big acquisitions, big pipeline news.

ALEX: Before we get into it, quick disclaimer: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good to have that out there. Okay, let's talk numbers. Gilead's base business — that's total product sales excluding the COVID drug Veklury — came in at $7.6 billion, up 10% year-over-year. That's their strongest second-quarter growth in three years.

ALEX: And it's broad-based too. HIV sales were up 12% to $5.7 billion, Trodelvy in oncology up 26%, and Livdelzi in liver disease more than doubled. On the back of that, management raised full-year HIV growth guidance to 9-10%, up from 8%.

JORDAN: The headline stat for me was PrEP — that's HIV prevention. Quarterly PrEP sales topped $1 billion for the first time, doubling year-over-year, putting that business on a $4 billion annual run rate. Yeztugo, their twice-yearly injectable, is now the leading option for new PrEP starts and even leads the switch market after just four quarters on the market.

ALEX: And they shared something pretty striking — more than 70% of Yeztugo patients are coming back for their second injection at six months, meaning they get a full year of protection. That persistency rate is apparently well above anything else in the category.

JORDAN: Now, EPS is where things get messy — but for a good reason. Non-GAAP diluted EPS was actually negative $6.75 for the quarter.

ALEX: Wait, negative? That sounds alarming.

JORDAN: It sounds alarming, but it's really an accounting story. Gilead closed three acquisitions this quarter — Arcellx, Tubulis, and Ouro Medicines — totaling about $11.2 billion in acquired R&D expense, which under accounting rules gets taken as a hit all at once. Strip that out, along with a one-time non-cash revenue item, and EPS was actually $2.27 for the quarter — up about 13% year-over-year on an apples-to-apples basis. That's outpacing revenue growth, which tells you there's real operating leverage in this business.

ALEX: Right, and full-year guidance reflects that same split — they're now guiding to $30.1 to $30.4 billion in total product sales, raised from prior guidance, but full-year EPS on a GAAP-ish basis is guided negative because of those acquisition costs. Excluding the deal noise, full-year EPS guidance is $8.50 to $8.85, actually raised slightly on the low end.

JORDAN: So the deals are the real story of the quarter, strategically speaking. Let's unpack them. Arcellx gives Gilead full ownership of anito-cel, their multiple myeloma cell therapy — that's five months from its PDUFA date, so a launch is coming. Tubulis brings an antibody-drug-conjugate platform, and there's already exciting early data on GS-8824 in ovarian cancer — 61% response rate in a tough, pretreated population.

ALEX: And on the existing portfolio side, it wasn't just an acquisitions quarter. Trodelvy got approved for first-line metastatic triple-negative breast cancer, roughly doubling its addressable patient population. Livdelzi, the liver disease drug, posted positive phase III data that could expand its use. And they launched Hepcludex, the first-ever approved treatment for chronic hepatitis D.

JORDAN: One thing that jumped out in the Q&A — an analyst pushed CEO Dan O'Day on whether Gilead still cares about diversifying away from HIV, since HIV remains such a dominant chunk of revenue. His answer was basically "yes, but we're doing it two ways" — diversifying within HIV itself with new dosing options, dai

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**WELCOME BACK TO BETA FINCH**

ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown, bringing you the numbers and the narrative behind the companies moving markets. I'm Alex.

JORDAN: And I'm Jordan. Today we're diving into EOG Resources' second quarter 2026 results — and Alex, this one's got some genuinely fun stuff in it, including oil wells in the UAE.

ALEX: We'll get there. But first, the disclaimer, because we always start with it: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Good, glad that's out of the way. Okay Alex, break down the numbers for us — this was apparently a record quarter for EOG.

ALEX: It really was. Adjusted earnings per share came in at $5.70, adjusted cash flow per share hit $8.29, and free cash flow was $2.8 billion — all record levels. CEO Ezra Yacob credited robust oil prices, but he was careful to frame this as more than just a commodity tailwind — he called it "consistent, high-quality execution."

JORDAN: And the shareholder return story backs that up. They returned just over $1.8 billion to shareholders in the quarter — $540 million in dividends, $1.3 billion in buybacks. They've now got $11.7 billion left on the repurchase authorization, and they're reiterating that commitment to return at least 70% of annual free cash flow in 2026.

ALEX: The balance sheet numbers are what really stood out to me. $4.9 billion in cash, net debt of just $3 billion, and — this is the eye-popping one — a WTI breakeven price below $50 a barrel for the whole 2026 program. That's a lot of cushion.

JORDAN: Twenty-eight years without a dividend cut or suspension, too. That's not a typo — that track record spans multiple oil crashes, COVID, you name it.

ALEX: Right, and guidance-wise, they're holding capex steady at $6.5 billion for the year, targeting 5% oil production growth and 14% total production growth. Let's talk strategy now, because the headline story this quarter was really about exploration — specifically, international exploration.

JORDAN: Yeah, this was the most interesting part of the call for me. EOG drilled two one-mile wells in the UAE with ADNOC, and in the first 30 days those wells averaged over 25,000 barrels of oil per well — flowing naturally, not even on artificial lift yet.

ALEX: And Keith Trasko, their SVP of Exploration, said the geologic analog they're using is the Eagle Ford — similar rock type, similar product mix, similar GOR and API gravity. So this isn't some totally unknown formation to them; it rhymes with a play they've drilled for over a decade.

JORDAN: Executives were pretty clear-eyed about it too — Ezra called it early innings, a 900,000-acre concession, three-year exploration phase, and ADNOC has an option to back in down the line. They're not rushing toward a final investment decision.

ALEX: There was also a really human moment in the Q&A about the Iran conflict's impact on operations. Ezra said that despite intermittent operations in Bahrain due to the conflict, the crisis actually became — his words — "an opportunity to stress-test the relationship with our partners," and that communication with ADNOC and Bapco had been transparent throughout.

JORDAN: Domestically, the other big reveal was a new Austin Chalk "sweet spot" in Lavaca County, Texas — 60,000 net acres leased at around $1,200 an acre, adjacent to their Eagle Ford position. Twelve wells drilled so far showing sub-one-year payouts and returns over 100% at $65 WTI.

ALEX: Jeff Leitzell, the COO, framed that as roughly a full extra year of drilling inventory for their San Antonio division. And it's a good example of their broader theme this quarter — using their in-house techni

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ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. Today we're digging into Duke Energy's second quarter 2026 results. Duke's the largest regulated utility fleet in the country, so this one's worth paying attention to.

Before we dive in, a quick note: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: Alright, let's get into the numbers. Duke posted adjusted EPS of $1.43 for Q2, up nicely from $1.25 a year ago. Reported EPS came in at $1.38.

ALEX: And the growth story here is pretty straightforward — electric utilities and infrastructure added $0.15 year-over-year, driven by customer growth and all the infrastructure investment they're pouring into their service territories. Gas utilities were roughly flat, which management chalked up to it just being a seasonally quiet quarter.

JORDAN: Worth flagging — favorable weather helped too. Cold first quarter, hot second quarter, and Duke's generating fleet cashed in on that demand. CFO Brian Savoy actually said they might reinvest some of that weather upside back into their generating facilities in the back half of the year. That's a smart move — banking some of the windfall into asset reliability rather than just letting it flow straight to the bottom line.

ALEX: Big picture, they reaffirmed full-year guidance of $6.55 to $6.80 in adjusted EPS, and they're sticking with their long-term target of 5% to 7% EPS growth through 2030. But here's the headline: management said they're increasingly confident they'll land in the top half of that range starting in 2028.

JORDAN: That 2028 timing matters. That's when the big economic development projects — mainly data centers — start ramping up under their electric service agreements, or ESAs. Duke's now signed 7.8 gigawatts of these agreements, and they're targeting the full 15.4 gigawatt pipeline to convert by the first half of 2027.

ALEX: Let's talk about the capital side because it's massive. Duke's running what they call the industry's largest regulated capital plan — over a billion dollars a month going into the ground. And on top of the existing five-year plan, they flagged another $5 to $10 billion of potential upside, mostly tied to new generation and transmission needs in Indiana and Florida as more of these large-load contracts get signed.

JORDAN: That's a real growth lever, but I want to highlight something else — the regulatory side. Duke reached a settlement in North Carolina on their DEC rate case: 9.8% ROE, 53% equity layer, and they kept an earnings sharing mechanism that lets them earn up to 10.3% ROE if they outperform. They're now trying to reach a similar settlement for the DEP case, with a hearing scheduled and orders expected by mid-November on both.

ALEX: Constructive regulatory outcomes are the backbone of the utility thesis, and Duke's track record here is strong. They also rolled out something called the Customer Protection Plus commitment — basically formalizing that large data center customers pay their own way and don't stick existing ratepayers with the bill. That's a direct response to the affordability concerns we're hearing across the sector.

JORDAN: Speaking of affordability — that came up a lot in the Q&A, especially around Indiana. There's been real political pressure there given rising costs generally, and analysts pushed CEO Harry Sideris on whether Duke might use a GENCO-type structure to help finance large-load generation separately. His answer was essentially: we've looked at it before, didn't need it then, but we're open to revisiting it as these big contracts get signed.

ALEX: The nuclear conversation was interesting too. Duke's doing about 300 megawatts of upra

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WELCOME TO BETA FINCH, YOUR AI-POWERED EARNINGS BREAKDOWN

ALEX: Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. I'm Alex, joined as always by Jordan, and today we're digging into Disney's fiscal third quarter, reported August 5th. Before we get into it, quick disclaimer: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions.

JORDAN: And there's a lot to get into here, Alex, because this was genuinely a strong quarter for the House of Mouse.

ALEX: It really was. Let's start with the headline numbers. Total segment operating income was up 21% year-over-year, company-wide revenue grew 7%, and the star of the show was the Experiences segment — that's parks, cruises, and consumer products — which hit a record $10 billion in quarterly revenue, up 10% from last year.

JORDAN: And it wasn't just revenue growing because people are paying more to walk through the gates. Global guest counts were up 4%, domestic park attendance was up 3%, and per-capita spending was up another 4% on top of that. So you've got volume and pricing both moving in the right direction at the same time.

ALEX: Which CEO Josh D'Amaro made a point of highlighting — he said flat out they're not "discounting their way to volume growth," even though they rolled out things like after-2pm pricing at Walt Disney World and Anaheim resident discounts. Those are targeted promotions to specific customer segments, not a sign of underlying weakness.

JORDAN: Right, and CFO Hugh Johnston backed that up when analysts pushed on it — international attendance in Shanghai and Hong Kong has been soft due to a weaker Asian consumer, but domestic tourism and local resident growth more than offset it. They actually raised full-year guidance for Experiences operating income to the high end of their previous high-single-digit growth range.

ALEX: Now let's talk content, because this quarter had a bit of a mixed bag theatrically. Toy Story 5 crossed a billion dollars at the global box office — huge win. But The Mandalorian and Grogu and the live-action Moana both underperformed expectations.

JORDAN: And here's the interesting part — management basically said, "so what?" Hugh Johnston called the film business "a portfolio game" and pointed out that even when a movie doesn't crush it theatrically, the IP still pays off elsewhere. The Mandalorian and Grogu drove retail sales and traffic to the Millennium Falcon attraction at the parks. That's the whole "Disney flywheel" thesis — one story, monetized across theaters, streaming, parks, and merchandise.

ALEX: Which, by the way, Toy Story is the poster child for — five films, over $4 billion in box office, 2 billion-plus hours streamed, four theme park lands, nineteen attractions, two hotels. That's a level of cross-platform integration that's genuinely hard for competitors to replicate.

JORDAN: And they got a nice tailwind they didn't even make — Sony's Spider-Man had a record-breaking opening weekend this past weekend, and Josh was quick to point out Disney still owns a piece of that character's value through consumer products, parks, and streaming even though Sony released the film. Nice reminder that IP value doesn't always require Disney to foot the production bill.

ALEX: Let's shift to streaming, because that's where a lot of the long-term story is being written. SVOD operating margin came in at 13% this quarter, and they're still targeting double-digit margins for the full fiscal year. Big milestone too — Hulu subscribers can now link profiles and manage everything through the Disney+ app, which is a step toward that "One Disney" unified experience.

JORDAN: And the announcement that got people talking this morning was the TikTok distribution deal. The idea is to bring

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