Weekly Update – January 30, 2023
The Week on Wall Street
Stocks added to their early 2023 gains amid a busy stream of mixed corporate earnings results and conflicting economic data.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1.81%, while the Standard & Poor’s 500 added 2.47%. The Nasdaq Composite index rose 4.32% for the week. The MSCI EAFE index, which tracks developed overseas stock markets, increased by 1.14%.1,2,3
Stocks Advance
With the backdrop of earnings reports and conflicting economic data, stocks climbed higher on cooling inflation, continued economic resilience, and fourth-quarter corporate earnings results that, while underwhelming, did not appear as bad as many had feared.
There was enough new economic data to support both the “recession is coming” and the “soft landing” camps. It was corporate results and continued labor market strength, along with a solid, if weakening, fourth-quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth number, however, that raised investors’ hopes that a potential recession may be mild and likely pushed out to later in the year.
GDP Report
The U.S. economy expanded at a 2.9% annualized rate in the fourth quarter, slightly exceeding consensus estimates of 2.8% but down from the third quarter’s 3.2% growth rate. Consumer spending, which accounts for over two-thirds of GDP, rose 2.1%. Increases in private inventory investment, government spending, and nonresidential fixed investment also contributed to the fourth quarter’s growth. Weakness in housing and a drop in exports subtracted from the quarter’s result.4
Beneath the headline number, the personal consumption expenditures price index (the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation) rose 3.2%. That was lower than the third quarter’s 4.8% increase, though it remains above the Fed’s 2% inflation target rate.5
THIS WEEK: KEY ECONOMIC DATA
Wednesday: Federal Open Market Committee Announcement. Job Openings and Turnover Survey (JOLTS). Institute for Supply Management (ISM) Manufacturing Index. Automated Data Processing (ADP) Employment Report.
Thursday: Factory Orders. Jobless Claims.
Friday: Employment Situation. Institute for Supply Management (ISM) Services Index.
THIS WEEK: COMPANIES REPORTING EARNINGS
Monday: Principal Financial Group, Inc. (PFG).
Tuesday: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD), Pfizer, Inc. (PFE), Caterpillar, Inc. (CAT), General Motors Company (GM), McDonald’s Corporation (MCD), Amgen, Inc. (AMGN), United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS), Stryker Corporation (SYK).
Wednesday: Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc. (TMO), Humana, Inc. (HUM), TMobile US, Inc. (TMUS).
Thursday: Apple, Inc. (AAPL), Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN), Ford Motor Company (F), Alphabet, Inc. (GOOGL), Qualcomm, Inc. (QCOM), Bristol Myers Squibb Company (BMY), Merck & Co., Inc. (MRK), Eli Lilly and Company (LLY), Honeywell International, Inc. (HON).
Friday: Cigna Corporation(CI), Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (REGN).
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1. The Wall Street Journal, January 27, 2023
2. The Wall Street Journal, January 27, 2023
3. The Wall Street Journal, January 27, 2023
4. CNBC, January 26, 2023
5. CNBC, January 26, 2023