In this July 21, 2026 episode of the One of a Kind Financial Show Daily, Certified Financial Planner Mike Milligan opens with a market recap showing all four major U.S. indexes closing lower, noting Apple’s drag on the Dow, rising oil prices, and higher Treasury yields. He frames the day’s market pause as a normal breathing point rather than a sector‑specific issue. Milligan then spotlights four upcoming earnings reports—General Motors, 3M, Coca‑Cola, and Philip Morris—as micro‑bars of American consumer behavior. For each company he outlines analyst expectations, revenue size, and the consumer insight the report could reveal (e.g., GM’s handling of tariffs, 3M’s breadth across households and businesses, Coke’s volume versus price dynamics, and Philip Morris’s ZYN nicotine pouch growth). He emphasizes that these earnings collectively scan the “American wallet.” After the earnings preview, Milligan shares a personal travel story about an unplanned stop in Helper, Utah, describing the town’s history, art scene, and striking landscape, and uses it to illustrate his planning philosophy: a financial plan should create margin for unexpected moments, with money serving the moments rather than the reverse. The episode closes with a reminder that the content is educational, not investment advice, and includes standard disclosures and a “never miss a moment” motto.
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Welcome to the One of a Kind Financial Show Daily. I'm Mike Milligan, Certified Financial Planner, founder of One Oak Financial, and host of the Ideas by Mike podcast. It's Tuesday, July 21st. Yesterday, every single major US stock index closed in the red. This morning, 4 American companies you have heard of report earnings, and each one tells us a different story about the American wallet. Plus, Leon and I are on the road, and yesterday's drive gave us a stop we did not see coming. Educate, coach, plan. Never miss a moment.
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Yesterday was a red day across the board. Monday's close had the Dow at 51,839, down 307 points. S&P down 0.2%. NASDAQ Composite down less than 1/10 of 1%. And Russell 2000 closed at 2,942. Which was underwater by 0.7%. Every one of the 4 major indexes finished lower. Apple was a big weigh on the Dow, losing about 2% on the day. Oil prices moved higher on continued tensions in the Middle East. Treasury yields ticked up, and the whole tape was cautious ahead of what, what may be the biggest earning week of the summer. Alphabet, Tesla, IBM, and Intel all report this week, and the market wanted to see the numbers before doing anything bold. Here is the read for planning purposes: when every major index goes red on the same day, this is not a story about one sector. This is the whole market pausing to breathe, and that is fine. That's part of what normal markets do.
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Now to the reason the market Markets paused. Today, 4 American companies you have heard of report earnings before the opening bell, and each one is a different window into how the American consumer is spending, saving, and paying bills. General Motors is going to report before the opening today. Analysts expect adjusted earnings of about $3.19 per share on a revenue of roughly $46.6 billion. GM had a strong first quarter with earnings of $3.70 per share, but this quarter tariffs on imported vehicles and parts are part of the story. If GM tells us today that they are absorbing the tariff costs, the American consumer is protected, but GM margins take the hit. If GM tells us they are passing tariff costs through to the sticker price, the American consumer pays more for a truck or an SUV. Either way, the read on the American car buyer starts with this report. The next company, 3M, the maker of Scotch tape, Post-it notes, Command hooks, and thousands of industrial products. Analysts expect earnings of about $2 per share on revenue of roughly $6.3 billion. Why does 3M matter for the consumer read? Because 3M sits Inside almost every category of American life— hardware stores, office supply stores, hospitals, factory, and home. When 3M reports what the consumers are ordering, this is a read on both the American household and the American business. The 3rd company, Coca-Cola. Coke reports the day before the opening. Coca-Cola is the classic read on everyday consumers, a $2 transaction that repeats billions of times across America every week. Analysts expect about $0.79 per share on about $12.6 billion in revenue. What we are watching? Volume versus price. If people are still drinking more Coke, the consumer is confident. If Coke's revenue is growing only because prices went up while volume stayed flat or fell, the consumer is stretched.
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Philip Morris. This is the maker of Marlboro International plus the ZYN nicotine pouch brand that has exploded in the United States. Analysts expect earnings of about $2.14 on revenue near $10.6 billion. ZYN's growth is one of the most watched consumer stories in America. Whether you agree with the product or not, it is a data point on habits, on discretionary spending, and on how the American consumer allocates their small daily budget. Added together— trucks, sticky notes, Coke, and nicotine pouches— that is a scan of the American wallet. This is educational only, not a recommendation for any of them, but by lunch today the markets will know about how the American household is spending when it, uh, spending. It's gonna know more than, uh, today about, uh, yesterday on how the American was spending. We're not chasing returns, we're just reading the consumer.
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Now, in a personal moment, Liana and I yesterday traveled from Park City, Utah down to Moab, Utah. We were on the road, and what a beautiful drive. There seemed to be some snow-capped peaks in the rearview mirror and in front of us, red rocks on the horizon, and about 2/3 of the way down, we made a stop we did not plan on— Helper, Utah. Never heard of Helper. Well, neither had we. It's a small town of about 2,200 people upon our research, tucked into the mouth of the Prince Canyon right above the Book Cliffs. This dramatic wall of red and gray sandstone feels like it's going to crash right into the town's main street. Here's what made it worth the stop. Helper was once a coal miner town and railroad town. The name comes from the helper locomotives that were added to trains to push them up the steep grade of Soldier Summit. In the last 20 years, Helper reinvented itself as an art destination. Main Street is lined with galleries, a coffee shop, and even an 18-foot fiberglass coal miner named Big John who guards the town like a centennial. There's a museum, the Western Mining and Railroad Museum, that walks you through everything from the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad survey to Butch Cassidy's connection to the region. And that scenic drive south, That pivot from mountain green to red rock desert as you drop out of Helper into Green River and toward Moab is one of the most surprising landscape transitions in the American West. Here's the planning point: never miss a moment. When you build a plan that gives you margin to say yes to an unplanned stop or an unplanned town on an unplanned road, that's when the plan is doing its job. Money is not the point of the plan. Moments are the point of the plan. Money is what lets you afford the moments.
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Finally today, 4 indexes in the red yesterday, 4 earnings reports this morning that scan the American wallet in a Utah town most people have never heard of. That reminds me of why we do this work in the first place. The market will tell us about the American consumer today. Our plan is what tells Us about our own family, our own moments, and our own margin to say, yes, we're not chasing returns. We're building a one-of-a-kind financial plan for your one-of-a-kind life. We're all learning, folks. So, so until tomorrow, educate, coach, plan. It's my mission. Never miss a moment is my motto. This program is for educational purposes only. It's not investment advice, not a recommendation to buy or sell any specific security or product. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Consult your license— your own licensed financial professional before making any purchases or sales and investment decisions. I am an investment advisor representative with Advisory Alpha LLC. Ideas by Mike, doing business as One Oak Financial, is an unaffiliated entity of Advisory Alpha LLC.
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