Goldman From All Angles

Goldman Sachs (GS Quote) reports third-quarter earnings results ahead of Thursday's opening bell. Market players are eagerly awaiting the report to confirm that credit meltdown issues are no longer affecting this financial powerhouse. Simply stated, it's highly unlikely this particular operation is going to disappoint investors in its quarterly ritual.

That optimism didn't stop influential analyst Meredith Whitney from downgrading the stock on Tuesday morning, triggering a selloff that spread throughout the financial sector. Unfortunately, yesterday's market gurus believe their press releases too intently and tend to overshoot their knowledge base at key turning points. Just ask former PaineWebber analyst Walter Piecyk about his ill-timed $1,000 call on Qualcomm (QCOM Quote) in late 1999.

As usual, I'll rely on the price charts to uncover my version of the truth rather than depend on Wall Street's self-absorbed talking heads. To that end, let's examine Goldman Sachs, past and present, to see what we can expect after Thursday's market-moving event.

Goldman Sachs (GS) -- Monthly Source: eSignal

The company came public in May 1999, opening in the lower $50s. It more than doubled in price over the next year, finally topping out at $133 in October 2000. The stock then joined the rest of the equity universe in the tech-driven bear market, dropping to $58 in late 2002. It bottomed at that level and entered a historic five-year bull advance.

The broad uptrend proceeded in two distinct phases: From the 2002 low into early 2006, the stock retraced the 75-point range of the prior bear market. It finally broke out to an all-time high and took off like a rocket, adding 100 points in the next 16 months. At that point, the long uptrend's easy money was gone.