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The other big headline this weekend: BRK is back to buying equities. Link here.
Link here.
From the linked article:
Strong earnings reports from the U.S.’s largest companies are powering major indexes to new records, easing some concerns that the recent rally is overly dependent on a handful of artificial-intelligence stocks.
Some concerns.
Among the more than 440 S&P 500 companies reporting second-quarter earnings so far, 86% have beaten analysts’ estimates, according to FactSet data. That puts the index on track for a seventh consecutive quarter of double-digit earnings growth. A run of upbeat reports from companies including Palantir, Caterpillar and Walt Disney this past week fueled a climb that carried stock indexes to their best weekly gains since April.
Investors still have plenty of volatility-fueling worries: the on-again, off-again war with Iran and new questions about how the Federal Reserve will fight inflation. Many note that earnings growth remains heavily concentrated in energy and AI stocks, particularly skyrocketing profits at memory companies supplying the AI build-out.
But earnings season is reassuring many that a strong core of corporate profitability underpins the market’s gains.
“These earnings are ridiculous,” said Phil Blancato, chief market strategist at Osaic. “These profit margins are incredible.”
In the coming week, investors will hear from companies including Cisco and Applied Materials, and parse the latest reading of the consumer-price index.
Companies in the S&P 500 have posted a roughly 50% jump in blended earnings growth, according to FactSet data, the most since the stimulus-fueled pandemic recovery in 2021. For energy firms, that rises to more than 147%, while totaling around 117% and 92% for communication-services and consumer-discretionary sectors, respectively. For tech, it was 70%.
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