QQQ Earnings Checklist: Do the Top 15 Holdings Still Earn Their Price?
Over the long run, stock prices follow profits. This checklist scores the 15 biggest companies in the Nasdaq-100 ETF (QQQ) on plain rules: is the earnings trend intact, is the price fair for that trend, and is volatility calm with no earnings report close. Then it weights those scores by each company’s share of QQQ to answer one question: does QQQ look like a good buy right now? Every number is sourced and dated, and you can edit the inputs.
By this earnings checklist, QQQ looks fairly priced right now: a solid earnings core, but enough of the weight is expensive, slowing or near an earnings report to keep it from a clear buy.
Biggest contributors
NVDA 85/100 × 13.5% = 11.5 pts
MSFT 100/100 × 10.5% = 10.5 pts
AAPL 70/100 × 13.2% = 9.2 pts
MU 100/100 × 7.2% = 7.2 pts
GOOGL 70/100 × 8.6% = 6.1 pts
Biggest drags (points lost)
TSLA 30/100 (Fails the earnings test), −4.0 pts
AAPL 70/100 (Fair), −4.0 pts
SPCX 40/100 (Caution), −2.7 pts
GOOGL 70/100 (Fair), −2.6 pts
How it works: each company scores 0–100 on the three stock checks below: earnings trend 40 points, price vs growth 40, volatility and earnings window 20. A pass earns full points, a caution ¼, a fail 0, and failing either earnings check caps a company at 40. The QQQ score weights those by each company’s QQQ weight, rescaled over the top 15, which cover 60.17% of the fund (16 of 105 positions, Invesco holdings dated Nov 3, 2026); the rest isn’t scored. 80+ Strong, 60–79 Fair, under 60 Caution. It updates when you edit any card. Education only, not investment advice.
IV Rank (1y)48— based on VXNVXN 25.08 (Nasdaq-100 implied vol, a proxy for QQQ). 1y low 17.20, high 33.54. IV percentile 64%. As of Nov 4, 2026. What is IV Rank?
QQQ close $691.95 · Cboe 30-day IV 22.1%
Your part: trade the setup
The score tells you whether the game is worth playing. Evaluate the position, then trade the setup: pick a structure that fits the score, size it so a bad stretch can’t knock you out, and decide your profit target, stop and time exit before you enter.
1. NVDA 8.15%
NVIDIA Corp
Fair · 85/100
Close $200.13 · P/E 25.3 trailing, 12.6 forward · 30-day IV 46.4% · next earnings Nov 17, 2026
IV Rank (1y)not available yet— no free year of NVDA IV history; logging Cboe 30-day IV daily (2 of 252 days)
Multi-year earnings trajectory intact or improving
EPS grew 21.5%/yr over two fiscal years and consensus has 12.7% growth next year.
~
Price / multiple reasonable vs that trajectory
Forward P/E 32.8 vs 17.1% growth: PEG 1.92, a full price for the growth.
✓
Volatility and time-decay characteristics favorable
30-day IV 22.7% and no earnings report in the next 30 days, so time decay works without an event in the way. IV Rank (1y) 50: premium is rich, usually because the market is nervous.
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3. MSFT 6.33%
Microsoft Corp
Strong · 100/100
Close $555.80 · P/E 28.2 trailing, 23.0 forward · 30-day IV 25.4% · next earnings Jan 27, 2027
IV Rank (1y)not available yet— no free year of MSFT IV history; logging Cboe 30-day IV daily (2 of 252 days)
Multi-year earnings trajectory intact or improving
EPS grew 164.6%/yr over two fiscal years and consensus has 46.1% growth next year.
✗
Price / multiple reasonable vs that trajectory
Forward P/E 69.2 vs 48.0% growth: PEG 1.44 (fail above 3 or a P/E above 60). Earnings more than doubled a year: a cyclical peak can make a P/E look cheap.
✓
Volatility and time-decay characteristics favorable
30-day IV 48.9% and no earnings report in the next 30 days, so time decay works without an event in the way.
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What the checklist found today
With the default inputs QQQ scores 75/100: Fair. 5 of 15 companies rate Strong (MSFT, MU, AMD, META, AVGO), and 3 fail an earnings check (TSLA, COST, PLTR). An earnings report in the next 30 days is the most common reason for a caution on the volatility check.
The checks, and the exact rules
Earnings trajectory. Pass when diluted EPS grew at least 8% a year over the last two fiscal years (three 10-K years from the SEC) and analysts expect at least 8% growth next fiscal year. Fail when the latest year’s EPS is not positive, or both are negative. Anything else is a caution.
Multiple vs trajectory. Growth = the average of those two rates, each capped at 50% so a one-year spike can’t make any price look cheap. PEG = forward P/E ÷ growth. Pass at PEG 1.5 or less with a forward P/E of 40 or less; fail above PEG 3, a forward P/E above 60, or no positive growth.
Volatility and time decay. Pass when 30-day IV is at least 20% and no earnings report is due in the next 30 days. IV Rank (1y) is shown for context where a year of history exists.
A company is Strong only when all three checks pass (100), Fair at 60–89 (for example both earnings checks pass but a report is due within 30 days: 85) and Caution below 60. A fail on check 1 or 2 always shows “Fails the earnings test”, because the whole idea is to follow earnings.
Price = earnings × multiple. Over the long run, stocks follow earnings. Earnings are the business. The multiple is the mood: fear, greed and interest rates. In the short run the multiple swings and drowns out everything else. That’s variance. In the long run, earnings compounding does the heavy lifting. That’s expected value. Growing profits are the edge built into owning the index; the multiple decides how much you pay for that edge on any given day.
The checklist is the count. A card counter bets more when the count favors them and bets the minimum, or leaves, when it doesn’t. Read the QQQ score the same way: Strong means earnings and prices line up and the edge is there at a fair price. Fair or Caution means the edge is thinner, so you size smaller or wait. The score doesn’t predict next week. It tells you how good the game is right now.
Never get knocked out. Even a real edge can lose for years. After the 2000 peak the S&P 500 took seven years to get back, fell again in 2008, and didn’t stay above that level until 2013. After 2008, S&P 500 earnings were back above their 2007 peak by late 2011, about a year and a half before the index got back to its own 2007 high. Size every position so a multi-year break like that is something you sit through, not something that ends your run. That’s the whole point of bankroll management for positive-EV options.
Noise is what option sellers get paid for. The short-run swings that scare buyers are what puts and calls are priced on. When fear is high, IV Rank shows it, and premiums are richer. This page doesn’t suggest trades; it tells you whether the stocks under QQQ are worth owning in the first place.
An honest caveat. The close long-run link between prices and earnings covers about 150 years of the broad US market, not QQQ or any single stock. Part of it is built in, because two series that both grow for a century will always look closely linked. And the link was loose for years after 2000 and 2008. Treat it like a long-run edge, not a promise for the next few years.
Where the stocks-follow-earnings idea comes from
The idea behind this tool is an old one: over long periods, stock prices follow earnings. Robert Shiller’s S&P 500 data, which goes back to 1871, shows prices and earnings moving together very closely over the long run. That is about the broad US market over a very long window, not about QQQ or any one stock, and long trending series correlate highly almost by default. The useful part for a trader is the gap: prices run ahead of or behind earnings for years, and checks 1 and 2 measure that gap name by name.
Data and sources
Holdings and weights:Invesco QQQ holdings, file dated Nov 3, 2026. Alphabet’s GOOGL and GOOG are combined.
EPS history: diluted EPS from each company’s latest 10-K, through SEC EDGAR’s XBRL data. Using one filing keeps the three years on the same split-adjusted basis. Companies without three 10-K years (such as a recent IPO) show a caution on check 1.
Price, P/E and consensus estimates: Yahoo Finance (trailing and forward P/E; analysts’ average EPS estimate for this and next fiscal year, marked “e”; next earnings date). Forward P/E uses next fiscal year’s estimate. Estimates are forecasts, not facts.
Prices and 30-day IV: Cboe delayed quotes, snapshot Nov 4, 2026, 4:43 PM ET.
IV Rank (1y): Cboe VXN for QQQ; Cboe VXAPL, VXAZN and VXGOG for Apple, Amazon and Alphabet; other holdings once ETFap’s daily IV log reaches a year.
Education only. The QQQ Earnings Checklist is a scoring tool for general education. It is not investment, financial, tax or legal advice, and not a recommendation to buy or sell any security or option.
Rules, not judgment. Each check is a simple, published rule applied to public data. A pass is not a buy signal and a fail is not a sell signal.
No trade ideas. This page scores companies; it does not suggest any trade. The QQQ score is a rules-based summary, not a buy or sell signal.
Analyst estimates change. Forward EPS and growth are consensus forecasts, which are often wrong and are revised all the time.
No promise of results. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Use at your own risk and talk to a licensed professional about your situation.
ETFap is not affiliated with Invesco, Nasdaq, Cboe, the SEC, Yahoo or Robert Shiller. Full terms of use.
QQQ earnings checklist FAQ
Do stock prices really follow earnings?
Over long periods, broadly yes. In Robert Shiller’s S&P 500 data, which goes back to 1871, stock prices and earnings have moved together very closely over the long run. That describes the broad US market over a very long window, not QQQ or any single stock, and two series that both trend up over a century will show a high correlation almost automatically. Over 5 to 15 years, multiples can drift a long way from earnings. That gap is exactly what check 2 is for.
Why the top 15 holdings and not all of QQQ?
QQQ holds 105 positions, but it is weighted by market value, so the biggest names drive most of the fund. The 15 largest companies (Alphabet’s two share classes counted as one) were 60.2% of QQQ in Invesco’s holdings file dated Nov 3, 2026.
How is IV Rank worked out here?
IV Rank (1y) = (today’s implied volatility − 1-year low) ÷ (1-year high − 1-year low) × 100. For QQQ we use Cboe’s VXN index. For Apple, Amazon and Alphabet we use Cboe’s own single-stock volatility indexes (VXAPL, VXAZN, VXGOG). There is no free year of implied-volatility history for the other holdings, so ETFap logs each stock’s Cboe 30-day IV every trading day and will show its IV Rank once a full year exists. Until then the card says so rather than guessing. On the last build QQQ’s IV Rank was 48 (VXN 25.08, 1-year range 17.20 to 33.54).
How is the QQQ score calculated?
Each company gets a score out of 100 from the three stock checks, weighted so earnings matter most: earnings trend 40 points, price vs growth 40, volatility and the earnings window 20 (that one is about timing, not the business). A pass earns the full points, a caution a quarter, a fail none, and a company that fails either earnings check is capped at 40. The QQQ score is the average of those 15 scores weighted by each company’s weight in QQQ, rescaled so the top 15 add up to 100% (they are 60.2% of the fund; the other 39.8% is not scored). 80 or more is Strong, 60 to 79 Fair, under 60 Caution. It is a summary of the rules, not investment advice.
Can I change the numbers?
Yes. Open “Edit the inputs” on any card to change the forward P/E, the growth rates or the implied volatility, and the card re-scores right away, and so does the QQQ score at the top. Nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere; reload the page to start over.
Education only, not financial advice. This site is not affiliated with any fund issuer. Coins-per-share figures come from issuer websites and can be delayed or wrong, so check the issuer’s page before you rely on a number. Crypto is very volatile and you can lose money.