What will happen at Nvidia's impending earnings call?

Nvidia has a quarterly earnings call on Tuesday.

Awkward timing, to say the least.

It’s one of the biggest public events of the year for the corporate communications team under normal circumstances. But, of course, circumstances are far from normal: The CEO of 33 years — the only one the company has ever had — has stepped down amid a scandal or three. The chief financial officer is the new caretaker in the top job.

Analysts, investors, and the public at large want to hear everything that leadership has to say, because the value of Nvidia stock and how well the company does are critical to the AI boom — and therefore to the economy at large.

Earnings calls are pretty much always scripted, but Karen Woody, a professor at the Washington and Lee University of Law said that this one in particular will be especially planned-out.

“The first thing you do is you do run every single word by the attorneys,” she said.

Lawyers are always involved when companies disclose their financial results. However, now that government investigations may be on the way, Woody said that Nvidia will want to be extra careful about its words.

She said the company will also want get across a sense of continuity.

“They need to operate as if this is clearly something this company can get through, and … you know, the trains still are on time,” Woody said.

Woody said one benefit of having the chief financial officer step up is that she knows Nvidia’s business. Still, she and her comms team will be working through the weekend.

“I’m sure there are a number of rehearsals that have been going on,” said Anne-Taylor Adams, vice president of marketing and communications at Antenna, and has worked in corporate communications for a few publicly traded companies.

Roughly half of an earnings call is prepared remarks. The rest is Q&A from stock analysts, which means that the Nvidia execs will have to field some questions about what went down.

“You try and contain things with the facts that you know and can actually stand behind, and then really get back to the business of the quarter,” Adams said.

Adams said that it’s important for the communications team to know everything that might come out.

“And this is probably particularly gnarly,” she said, “because it is dealing with personal, familial relationships.”

Going forward with the earnings call despite the crisis is a signal of business as usual, said Woody.

“You know, basically,” she said, “‘Nothing to see here.'“