The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Tuesday was poised to open modestly higher, with Wall Street sentiment scoring a lift from better-than-expected quarterly results from retailers, including Home Depot Inc. and Walmart Inc.
How are stock benchmarks performing?
-
Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average
YM00,
+0.13% were up 13 points at 34,269. -
S&P 500 index futures
ES00,
+0.12% were up 2.70 points, or 0.1%, at 4,160.50. -
Nasdaq-100 futures
NQ00,
+0.35% rose 55.50 points, or 0.4%, to 13,359.
On Monday, the Dow
DJIA,
What’s driving that market?
Stock-market investors were trying to throw off a malaise that started the week, with investors poring over a batch of early quarterly results, as concerns about lofty valuations and rampant, post-COVID inflation run in the background.
Home Depot
HD,
Other heavyweight retailers, including Walmart Inc.
WMT,
Retailers are bringing up the rear of earnings season, with equity markets largely stuck in a range since mid-April thanks to a tug of war between optimism over a post-pandemic economic recovery and rising worries over inflation.
“Following the extraordinary rally since the March 2020 bottom and particularly since November, a period of consolidation for the market is not unexpected or unhealthy,” said Mark Hackett, chief of investment research at Nationwide, in emailed comments. “Markets are likely to continue in a saw-tooth pattern until we grow into our valuation.”
Attention was also building around President Joe Biden’s $2.3 trillion infrastructure proposal, with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen slated to deliver a speech at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in support of the proposal.
“We are confident that the investments and tax proposals in the (American) Jobs Plan, taken as a package, will enhance the net profitability of our corporations and improve their global competitiveness,” Yellen plans to say, according to an excerpt of her comments obtained by Axios.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg News reports that Republicans, led by West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, was set to deliver their own infrastructure plan.
In deal news, Amazon.com Inc.
AMZN,
The report comes a AT&T Inc. T and Discovery Inc. DISCA on Monday agreed on a $43 billion deal to combine their media holdings in a new company.
Data showed U.S. home builders started construction on homes at a seasonally-adjusted annual rate of 1.57 million in April, representing a 9.5% decrease from the previous month’s downwardly-revised figure, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Tuesday. Compared with April 2020 though, housing starts were up 67%, though the year-over-year comparison is skewed by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic’s onset a year ago.
The pace of permitting for new housing units increased again in March. Permitting for new homes occurred at a seasonally-adjusted annual rate of 1.76 million, up 0.3% from March and 61% from a year ago.
Investors may be looking for policy news, as Lawrence Summers, former secretary of the Treasury under Bill Clinton and director of the National Economic Council under Barack Obama, is set to speak at 10:05 a.m. Eastern at the second day at a conference hosted by the Atlanta Federal Reserve. Summers has criticized stimulus efforts as too aggressive.
Later in the morning, Dallas Fed Robert Kaplan and Atlanta Fed President Bostic will speak at the same conference at 11:05 a.m.
Which companies are in focus?
- Shares of Dow component Walmart were up nearly 4% in premarket action after delivering earnings and revenue that topped forecasts and raised its full-year guidance.
- Macy’s Inc. shares were up 2.8% after delivering a surprise earnings beat and lifting guidance.
- Flywire Corp. FLYW, set terms of its initial public offering, in which the Boston-based payments enablement and software company is looking to raise up to $208.8 million.
- BioNTech SE BNTX, the German biotech that joined with Pfizer Inc. PFE, to develop a COVID-19 vaccine that is authorized for use in the U.S., said Tuesday it has named Jens Holstein to be chief financial officer.
