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On the cusp of another earnings season, it seems like quarterly results are far from the forefront of investors’ minds.
After a hot jobs report and a consumer inflation reading that didn’t put to bed concerns about rising prices, there’s more confusion than usual about what the Federal Reserve will do next with rates. Hopes for China stimulus and its ripple effect have sprung up, but the picture there remains murky as well, as evidenced by the extreme volatility in Chinese stocks. Throw in a couple of literal hurricanes and a figurative one in the Mideast, and investors have a lot to weigh when making decisions.
Oh, and one more thing — the presidential election. Election years tend to be tough on October stock returns.
“An upcoming US Election, a surprise stimulus from China and a broadening Middle East conflict will continue to exaggerate the Macro, and its very uncertain uncertainties, over Micro this Earnings season,” Evercore ISI’s Julian Emanuel wrote in a recent note to clients.
It’s that typical election-related weakness that’s causing Emanuel to expect the S&P 500 will test 5,538 before climbing toward 6,000.
Indeed, as earnings reports start to roll out, first from the banks today and then broadening out next week, Bank of America thinks investors will be looking past the current noise.
“I think this earnings season is going to be pretty tricky,” Ohsung Kwon, US and Canada equity strategist at Bank of America, said in a recent interview. “I don't think the big focus is on Q3. Everyone basically knows that Q3 wasn't a very strong macro environment … So I don't think the bar is that high, but also the focus isn't really about Q3. It's really about companies' outlook on the other side of the curve. Now that the easing cycle has started, what are companies going to say about any early indications of improvement given the lower rate environment?”
All of that said, stocks could still benefit from estimate-beating numbers and raised forecasts, Kwon wrote in a note to investors. He expects earnings for the S&P 500 to have risen 4% year over year in the third quarter, a sharp slowdown from the 11% gain in the second. (Evercore puts the predicted gain at 6.5%).
Wherever the various strategists’ forecasts land, “As long as companies have managed through macro headwinds and see early signs of improvement from lower rates, stocks should get rewarded,” Kwon wrote.
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