Labor market conditions improved once again and jobless claims dropped to about 400,000 after rising last week, as economic activity picked up. Stocks rallied in the action-packed week and benchmark indexes Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 scaled all-time highs, after shrugging off the initial weakness.
Two deals that caught the market’s attention this week were tech firm HP’s offer to buy remote computing software company Teradici Corp. and the acquisition of spend intelligence vendor Suplari by Microsoft, though the financial terms are not yet known in both cases.
In the recent past, not a week has passed without Accenture adding new businesses to its fold, and this time it was Italy-based tech group Ethica Consulting. Meanwhile, Amgen has inked a pact to buy Teneobio for $900 million.
It was a busy week in terms of earnings announcements, with top players from across the corporate world revealing financial data for the recently-ended quarter. Proving its critics wrong once again, Tesla ended the first half on an upbeat note. The electric car maker was joined by aerospace giant Lockheed Martin on Monday in reporting second-quarter earnings.
FAANG components Alphabet and Apple stole the show on Tuesday, posting strong earnings that more than doubled year-over-year. The other most-awaited event of the day also came from the tech space – Microsoft registered impressive Q4 numbers. General Electric, United Parcel Service, JetBlue, and Visa also reported.
It was an equally upbeat show from Facebook, which reported a 56% spike in Q2 revenues midweek. Pharma giant Pfizer, aircraft builder Boeing, McDonalds, and PayPal were the other major Wall Street entities that published statistics on Wednesday. Thursday was not as busy as usual, with the earning releases of drugmaker Merck, Mastercard, and Amazon being the only major events. Caterpillar, Procter & Gamble, and ExxonMobil released their results on Friday.
The first week of August is going to be relatively less hectic, with no major events scheduled for the first few days. Camtek is preparing to release its Q2 report on August 4, to be followed by biopharma company Amarin and alcohol firm Constellation Brands on August 5. Draftkings is expected to unveil its most recent metrics on August 6.
Key Earnings to Watch
Monday: HSBC Holdings, Take-Two Interactive, Global Payments, Heineken NV, ON Semiconductor Corporation, Ferrari, Loews Corp, ZoomInfo Technologies, and Columbia Sportswear
Tuesday: Standard Chartered, BP plc, DuPont, Alibaba, NXP Semiconductors, Blue Apron Holdings, Marriott International, Under Armour, Ralph Lauren, Eli Lilly, ConocoPhillips, Amgen, Akamai Technologies, LYFT, and Activision Blizzard
Wednesday: CVS Health, VeriSign, Kraft Heinz, Charles River Laboratories, Hyatt Hotels, General Motors, Marathon Petroleum, Occidental Petroleum, Uber, Fox Corp, HubSpot, Electronic Arts, and Roku
Thursday: Rolls-Royce, ABIOMED, Papa Johns, Moderna, Becton, Dickinson, Bayer AG, Viacom, adidas AG, Murphy Oil, MetLife, Marathon Oil, Kellogg, Novavax, Expedia Group, Dropbox, GoPro, Square, Beyond Meat, News Corp, FireEye, and Motorola Solutions
Friday: PayPal Holdings, TripAdvisor, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, and Groupon
Key US Economic Events
Notable Transcripts
The following are notable companies which have reported their earnings last week. In case if you have missed catching up on their performance, click the respective links to skim through the transcripts to glean more insights.
Lockheed Martin Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
AT&T Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Southwest Airlines Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Tesla Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
General Electric Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
JetBlue Airways Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Alphabet Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Apple Q3 2021 Earnings Transcript
Starbucks Q3 2021 Earnings Transcript
Visa Q3 2021 Earnings Transcript
Microsoft Q4 2021 Earnings Transcript
Spotify Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Boeing Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Pfizer Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Facebook Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Merck Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Amazon Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
Pinterest Q2 2021 Earnings Transcript
If you want to listen to how management responds to analyst questions and the tone they use, you can head over to our YouTube channel to listen to conference calls on the go.