NEW YORK, Aug. 24 -- Nvidia has already told everyone what Wednesday's number will be. The company guided to $91.0 billion in revenue, plus or minus 2 per cent, when it reported in May. That figure has been public for three months. On Monday morning the market sold the stock anyway.

Nvidia was at $209.81 shortly before 11am in New York, down 2.29 per cent, having traded as low as $208.62. The shares are 11.3 per cent below their 52-week high of $236.54 and have lost 6.6 per cent in five sessions. This is not a market waiting nervously for a surprise. It is a market that has been given a number and has decided the number is not the point.

What is the point, on the evidence of Monday's tape, is everything sitting underneath that number. N...