Following two down days in a row, the market is looking up today. The big news? Well, it’s not the Fed’s decision to leave rates unchanged; that took the major indexes down.
Rather, today’s move up is thanks to good old-fashioned earnings reports.
After yesterday’s close, Microsoft (MSFT) reported earnings per share of $3.65 on revenue of $76.4 billion, trouncing Wall Street’s expectations.
Results for Meta (META) were even better. The company’s $7.14 earnings per share and $47.52 billion revenue beat expectations by 21% and 6% respectively.
Microsoft is the second largest company in the S&P 500, while Meta is the sixth largest, so they both have a huge impact on the movement of what is the most important benchmark for the stock market’s performance.
And with Microsoft shares up by 9% and Meta gaining 11% before the open, the S&P 500 would have a hard time being anything but up today. In fact, that index is gaining nearly 1% in premarket futures trading.
The Nasdaq, of which both Microsoft and Meta are also members, is up more than 1%.
Key earnings reports this morning include the following:
As usual, the heavy hitters will be reporting after the close. Apple (AAPL) and Amazon (AMZN) are included in that list, along with bitcoin plays Strategy (MSTR) and Coinbase (COIN) .
Here’s what to expect:
On the economics front, today’s reports include measures of employment, inflation and spending.
The Fed closely watches the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index. For June, it showed a year-over-year rise above expectations. At the same time, personal spending was lower than expected.
