Normally when you hear a company earned $1.21 billion dollars in net income in one quarter – a gain of 17% from the year prior, you’d think that is good news. Not for Google.

The problem of course is that Google didn’t quite live up to Wall Street’s expectations. Welcome to 2008 – companies doing well, but getting killed on high expectations and soft outlooks going forward.

Right now in after-hours trading Google’s stock has fallen almost 50 points all the way back down to the $515-a-share level. Just one month ago the stock was over $700 a share.

The stock is actually yo-yo-ing right now back and forth between being down 50 to being down 20, etc. Investors are likely looking at the stock and thinking “Wow Google is back near $500, time to buy!” – but while some do that driving the stock back up, others are selling sending it right back down. It’s just not a very good time to be an investor right now.

[UPDATE]: But long term I do still completely agree with what Mathew Ingram points out – the company, despite one miss is still pretty rock solid. The entire economy is in a rut right now, but it will get out of it just like it always does. So what I really meant to say was “it’s not a very good time to be a short-term investor right now”.