The earnings season is starting off on the back foot for global trade as moments ago, the company considered the world's logistics bellwether, FedEx, reported revenue and earnings that both missed badly.

For the first quarter ended August 31, FedEx reported adjusted earnings per share of $2.51, that not only missed but also missed the lowest analyst estimate of $2.87 (going up as high as $3.20) and certainly the consensus of $3.00.  Of course, on a GAAP basis the number was far worse, just $2.19 in Q1. The first quarter earnings was a 11% drop from the $2.82 adjusted EPS reported a year ago. FedEx also reported Q2 revenue of $15.3 billion, an increase from $14.7 billion a year ago, but a miss to the $15.4 billion consensus estimate.

But wait, it gets better because while traditionally one-time, non-recurring items would be excluded from non-GAAP EPS, the reason for the huge miss is that while FedEx was happy to add back everything else, it decided not to do that to the real one-time items, such as Hurricane Harvey and the June 27 hack. Instead, FedEx blamed these for reducing non-GAAP EPS by $0.79 and $0.02 respectively, or a total of $0.81. In other words, if one were to use Non-Non-GAAP or also known as "super bullshit EPS", Fedex earnings would be $3.32/share... when in reality they were $2.19. No surprise then that the market appears "cheap" when using non-GAAP numbers: they are all utter garbage.

Just as ironic, while FedEx said most TNT Express services resumed during the quarter and substantially all TNT Express critical operational systems have been restored; however, TNT Express volume, revenue, and profit "still remain below previous levels"... as if the hack had nothing to do with this particular structural decline.

Still, having found a useful scapegoat, and taking a page of the Hillary Clinton book (literally) FedEx not only blamed the quarterly miss, but also slashed guidance blaming, what else, hackers.

The company is lowering its fiscal 2018 forecast due to the estimated full-year impacts of the TNT Express cyberattack. Before year-end MTM pension accounting adjustments, earnings are now projected to be $11.05 to $11.85 per diluted share for fiscal 2018. The earnings forecast before year-end MTM pension accounting adjustments and excluding expenses related to TNT Express integration and certain first quarter FedEx Trade Networks legal matters is now $12.00 to $12.80 per diluted share for fiscal 2018. These forecasts assume moderate economic growth and continued recovery from the cyberattack.

“The impact of the cyberattack on TNT Express and lower-than-expected results at FedEx Ground reduced our first quarter earnings,” said Alan B. Graf, Jr., FedEx Corp. executive vice president and chief financial officer. “We are currently executing plans to mitigate the full-year impact of these issues.”

Previously, the company had seen $13.20-$14.00 which means a 12% cut in full year EPS due to a one-day hack.

In other news, FedEx said it still sees FY CapEx of $5.9 billion, in line with the $5.90 billion estimate and confirmed that effective January 1, 2018, it will increase shipping rates by an average of 4.9% across its various divisions, suggesting even more revenue and market share loss is imminent.

And while otherwise the idiot algos would have been eager to gobble up the company's adjusted bullshit miss, because apparently the sellside community was unable to factor in its expectations either the June 27 hacking which FedEx had repeatedly complained about, or Hurricane Harvey, which somehow everyone on the sellside missed, this time the various CPUs were not as forgiving and FedEx tumbled as much as 4.1% after hours, although we are confident that by tomorrow morning the stock will be back to unchanged courtesy of magic.