This is what Mauboussin talks about with Expectations Investing.
http://expectationsinvesting.com/
Expectations investing represents a fundamental shift from the way professional money managers and individual investors select stocks today. It recognizes that the key to achieving superior investment results is to begin by estimating the performance expectations embedded in the current stock price and then to correctly anticipate revisions in those expectations.
Traditional approach is to value a firm, then compare your estimated intrinsic value to the current stock price. If intrinsic value is substantially larger than current price, then buy.
Expectations investing is the idea that you can start with the stock price and infer the collective expectations about future cash flows. E.g., A hypothetical firm's stock price of $80 implies revenue growth of 25% per year for next 5 years and margins increasing to 15%. Then you can assess whether those implied expectations seem reasonable. If they seem dramatically lower than what you expect, then buy. (Or you could just read analysts' reports that provide both a price target and the underlying assumptions that they used to generate that price target.)
At the end of the day, it's the same process - you're comparing your estimate of firm value to the current market price (and the implied expectations supporting that price). But maybe it's a slightly different mental approach.
