Walmart, Home Depot, Retail Sales: 3 Things to Watch
By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com -- Stocks ticked mostly higher on Monday, shrugging off concerning news about economic weakness in China and the possibility of slowing global growth.
Disappointing data from China weighed on oil prices, which slumped and dragged down the entire energy sector. In China, industrial production was significantly weaker than expected.
Even in the U.S., however, there were signs of slowing growth as headlines blared the continued ongoing threat of a spreading Covid outbreak linked to the contagious Delta variant. The August Empire State index fell to 18.3 from 43 in July. Analysts had forecast a reading of 28.5.
Sonos Inc (NASDAQ:SONO) shares jumped after a judge ruled that Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)'s Google had infringed on some of the company's patents. An important ban could be imposed for some of Google's Pixel smartphones and Nest audio speakers.
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA), meanwhile, fell after the U.S. government launched an investigation into the safety of the electric automaker's driver assistance system after multiple crashes during the last three years.
It’s retail earnings week. Here are three things that could affect markets tomorrow:
1. Walmart earnings
Big retailers will have some tough comparisons to last year, when the pandemic forced people to hunker down at home and order stuff online for delivery or curbside pickup. One of the biggest beneficiaries of that trend was Walmart Inc (NYSE:WMT), which reports its earnings on Tuesday. Analysts tracked by Investing.com expect it to post revenue of $136.63 billion and earnings per share of $1.56.
2. Home Depot earnings
The pandemic also inspired a wave of home improvement projects as bored do-it-yourselfers took the opportunity to add that deck or refurnish their vacation home. That trend is ongoing, and the housing boom is also boosting home improvement retailers. Home Depot Inc (NYSE:HD) is expected to report second-quarter earnings per share of $4.42 on revenue of $40.48 billion.
3. Retail sales for July
In the spring, households were flooded with stimulus checks that spurred spending, but that likely cooled more recently, especially as a number of states have cut off extra federal pandemic unemployment assistance. Retail sales are likely to have fallen 0.2% in July on a month-on-month basis after a 0.6% rise in June. The data are due out at 8:30 AM ET (1230 GMT).
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Walmart, Home Depot, Retail Sales: 3 Things to Watch
