Nasdaq leads Wall Street gains, Dow edges down
Consumer discretionary is top sector gainer, utilities is biggest loser
Dollar rises, gold down 0.9%, crude up slightly, bitcoin up >2%
U.S. Treasury 10-year yield edges up to ~4.089%
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EARNINGS OUTLOOK CONTINUES TO IMPROVE AFTER BIG TECH WEEK
Estimated third-quarter earning growth for S&P 500 .SPX companies has gone up from a week ago, LSEG data on Friday showed at the end of a hectic week of earnings which featured some of the biggest U.S. technology companies.
Based on results from 315 of the S&P 500 companies and estimates for the rest, earnings are now seen up 13.8% for the third quarter from the year-end quarter. That is up from the week-ago estimated growth of 11.2% and matching the number recorded in the second quarter of 2025.
Big Tech was the focus this week with Apple AAPL.O, Microsoft MSFT.O, Alphabet GOOGL.O, Amazon.com AMZN.O and Meta Platforms META.O all having reported their numbers - the market's reaction though was mixed.
From a broader perspective, S&P 500 companies in aggregate are reporting earnings 8.3% above expectations compared to a long-term (since 1994) average of 4.3% above estimates and average of 7.1% for the prior four quarters. This is the highest surprise rate since the third quarter of 2021.
Of those that have reported thus far, 83.2% of the companies topped profit estimates and 80.1% beat revenue estimates, marking the biggest beat rate since the second quarter of 2021.
There's no slowing down the earnings juggernaut next week, with several companies including McDonald's MCD.N, Advanced Micro Devices AMD.O and Pfizer PFE.N among the prominent names reporting.
(Shashwat Chauhan)
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EARLIER ON LIVE/ MARKETS:
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NO TRICKS, SOME TREATS FOR MARKETS CLICK HERE