wednesday market open the market gives and the market takes away that’s the lesson microsoft msft shareholders learned since tuesday’s closing bell shares of the mammoth tech company initially bounced more than 3 on solid cloud business results for the december quarter only to retreat ahead of today’s opening bell as investors digested the company’s weak performance in other areas and what looked like lessthanstellar cloud growth guidance see more below boeing ba was another mammoth company whose earnings disappointed and premarket investors apparently saw that combination as a bit too much for a market that was already pulling back yesterday from its january rally stock index futures lost ground before the open while fixed income markets bounced as it looks like cautious trading may be the theme of the day today is likely to be about looking ahead to tomorrow’s gross domestic product gdp data and continuing to digest earnings yet while it’s easy to see why the market is down after a titan like msft reports remember that its share losses aren’t massive it takes a lot more than slightly negative guidance to dramatically move a leader   the us dollar index dxy slipped to 1019 this morning’s earnings parade is a bit shorter than yesterday’s still a few important companies did open their books abbott labs abt the medical company saw shares fall more than 2 ahead of the open despite beating wall street’s consensus estimates for both earnings per share eps and revenue it also issued fiscal 2023 guidance that was in line with the street’s estimates boeing ba shares lost altitude in premarket trading after the jet maker reported a q4 loss of 175 per share analysts had expected a profitable quarter revenue rose 35 year over year but still missed analysts’ average estimate ba did reaffirm previous guidance but said it has “more work to do” to drive stability in its operations and within its supply chain att t shares rose in premarket action after the telecommunications company beat wall street’s eps estimates and reported revenue in line with expectations t reported free cash flow of 141 billion in 2022 beating expectations as barron’s noted today free cash flow is an important metric for t because many investors there appreciate the company’s dividends and the cash flow that funds them tesla up next get set after the close for tesla nasdaq tsla recently tsla announced a dramatic price decrease across its product line after another tough year for electric vehicle ev manufacturers and the auto industry as a whole but wall street analysts generally remain optimistic about tsla’s stock in case you missed it here’s a preview of tsla and the electric vehicle industry’s earnings catch a flight consider tomorrow airlines day with expected earnings from american airlines aal southwest luv and alaska air alk travel’s been a hot sector lately thanks to sizzling travel demand with upbeat results last week from united airlines ual the luv earnings report however is expected to reflect the severe weather and staff turmoil that led to more than 16700 canceled flights and costs of up to 825 million over the holidays on january 6 the dallasbased carrier told the sec that it plans to report a q4 net loss and its earnings call could offer more detail on how it plans to avoid future troubles that left so much egg on its face tuesday’s main storyline from microsoft’s msft earnings was that the cloud segment rebounded most notably its azure platform posted a 31 rise in revenue and msft initially rose 3 in premarket trading after those headlines with cloud a prime focus since many companies cited slower business demand in the fall investors apparently took a closer look at msft’s expectations the tech giant said it expects growth of 17 to 19 for its intelligent cloud business in quarter ending in march with a deceleration in azure’s growth rate the 17 to 19 growth would put intelligent cloud revenue below wall street’s expectations also looking back at the last quarter msft also came in on the low end of revenue estimates and saw a slowdown in a lot of its business units including a big revenue drop in the more personal computing segment msft said in october it expected fiscal q2 revenue of between 524 billion and 534 billion the company ended up reporting 5275 billion below the average wall street estimate but in line with its guidance that represented just a 2 increase from a year ago and that’s likely to be a continuing story for info tech companies as earnings season advances analysts expect many of the biggest tech firms to take in less revenue in q4 than a year earlier msft’s earnings of 232 per share were slightly above the average wall street view of 229 so that was good to see but it was down from 248 a year ago comparisons across the tech sector could improve as the year moves along right now it’s tough for tech companies because they’re being measured against 2021 a huge year for demand tomorrow morning brings the government’s first look at q4 gross domestic product gdp consensus from briefingcom projects 26 a bit of a slowdown from 32 in q3 gdp is a backwardlooking report but thursday’s initial government estimate before the open could draw closer scrutiny than usual from wall street the fed’s been throwing everything it can at the economy trying to slow inflation a higherthanexpected gdp reading would likely raise concerns the central bank might have to get even more aggressive one aspect to watch beyond headline gdp is its personal spending component which rose to 23 in the final q3 report up from the second estimate of 17 for a long time investors could assume that when weaker economic news arrived the fed would take its foot off the brake and hit the accelerator that’s changed judging from the market’s poor reaction to last week’s december retail sales data it’s also likely a drop in personal spending from q3 could get the fisheye from investors so carefully watch the report’s price metrics for signs of progress against inflation the sp 500® index spx entered tuesday on a twoday rally with technical support seen at 4015 and 4000 early in tuesday’s session it dropped under both those levels bottoming at 3989 before rebounding around midmorning and trading in a tight range the rest of the day some of the early softness might’ve reflected a reported issue at the new york stock exchange nyse so it’s hard to say if performance reflected actual investor sentiment or if it was related to a brief trading halt in many wellknown stocks after that all got sorted out the spx’s 4016 close on tuesday just above the first level of support looked constructive on the charts so did its push through a technical downtrending line see chart below which it stayed above tuesday that’s impressive when you consider the relatively disappointing earnings season so far some major companies that came up short this week on either results or guidance include union pacific unp 3m mmm verizon vz and texas instruments txn yesterday investors again piled into shares of some of the market’s bestknown companies including apple aapl boeing ba caterpillar cat honeywell hon cocacola ko and jpmorgan chase jpm those stocks all have one thing in common they’re part of the dow jones industrial average® dji and the dji was the one major index to post gains tuesday the spx lost ground so did the technologydominated nasdaq composite® comp when semiconductor stocks that led the rally friday and monday turned red tuesday that shouldn’t be too surprising to anyone considering semiconductors collectively posted their best close since august on monday perhaps opening the sector up to a bit of profit taking ahead of intc earnings   the dji was the only major index with gains adding 104 points or 031 to close at 33733   the spx fell 286 points or 007 to 4016 tech next ibm ibm reports after the close today and intel intc steps up to the plate after tomorrow’s closing bell big blue stood out last year in a tech sector that saw its most popular companies collectively lose nearly 5 trillion in market capitalization according to barron’s ibm actually posted a slight gain in 2022 as the company worked on a transition toward the cloud and artificial intelligence software investors may also want to know whether ibm plans acquisitions in the coming year still the biggest crush of info tech and communication services earnings comes next week when meta meta amazon amzn apple aapl and alphabet googl all report over just two days ad revenue is a big metric to watch—especially at googl and meta it’s a big part of their revenue and industrywide online ads have been sluggish see more below ‘click dip’ hurting tech ad spending in the tech and media sectors slowed dramatically in 2022 media and tech research firm moffettnathanson told the atlantic recently by the end of the holidays there was “hardly any money being spent at all” the research firm said while meta and googl may come to mind first as potential victims of a soft advertising climate even firms like amzn and aapl could be sensitive to an ad spending slowdown said the publication adding that this advertising dip is coming on stronger and faster than the overall economic slowdown perhaps that could explain why tech’s been so aggressive in laying off employees lately even while the rest of the labor market seems healthy remember volatility yesterday marked the first anniversary of the vix hitting its 2022 peak near 40 it remained elevated most of the year trading well above 30 even into october since then it’s been a lap cat recently falling below its historic average of around 20 the thing to remember about the vix is how fast it can go from sleeping to hissing as it did at the start of the 2020 pandemic and in 2022 when inflation spiked russia invaded ukraine and inflation fears grew what could spike the vix again fresh geopolitical concerns from russia china and north korea come to mind a move toward 100 per barrel crude would also work as would serious brinkmanship in the battle over the us debt ceiling if the vix rallies again investors might be drawn from their current focus on growth stocks back toward perceived safety in staples and utilities jan 26 december durable goods and durable orders q4 gdp first estimate december new home sales and expected earnings from american airlines aal mastercard ma southwest airlines luv dow chemical dow alaska air alk and blackstone bx jan 27 december pce prices final january university of michigan consumer sentiment and expected earnings from american express axp and chevron cvx jan 31 start of fomc meeting january chicago pmi december consumer confidence and expected earnings from exxonmobil xom general motors gm pfizer pfe mcdonald’s mcd caterpillar cat and ups ups feb 1 fomc rate decision december construction spending january ism manufacturing and expected earnings from altria mo meta meta peloton pton and waste management wm feb 2 december factory orders and expected earnings from apple aapl amazon amzn and alphabet googl feb 3 january nonfarm payrolls and expected earnings from sanofi sny and cigna ci this post contains sponsored advertising content this content is for informational purposes only and not intended to be investing advice