Partly this has to do with investor mindset. If you are thinking about investing in a company which matters more? The earnings they just reported or the earning

Partly this has to do with investor mindset. If you are thinking about investing in a company which matters more? The earnings they just reported or the earnings they will report in the future once you buy the stock? The whole basis for normalizing earnings is to get to the real economic numbers you can expect a company to generate in the future. That means taking out what you believe are one-time costs, but again if you keep seeing the same adjustments every quarter, then something is up.