S&P 500 Traders Are Wating For the Busiest Weeks Of the Year: FOMC, ECB, BOJ, GDP and More

Not only do we have the highly anticipated Fed FOMC meeting Tuesday and Wednesday, but we also have central bank announcements coming from the European Central Bank (ECB) on Thursday morning, and an announcement by the Bank of Japan (BOJ) by weekend.

The market will also be digesting a ton of global inflation numbers late next week. Here at home, traders are going to be heavily focused on Tuesday’s updated Consumer Confidence numbers and Thursday’s release of US Q2 GDP.

Earnings

The trade is also eager to see a wave of US corporate earnings. Needless to say, big tech Q2 results and outlooks for the quarters ahead will be one of the main highlights next week. Google-parent Alphabet and Microsoft report on Tuesday, Meta on Wednesday, and Amazon on Thursday.

Other key results will include Domino’s Pizza, NXP Semiconductors, Packaging Corp. of America, Ryanair, and Whirlpool on Monday; 3M, ADM, Albertsons, Chubb, Dow, General Electric, KimberlyClark, NextEra Energy, Nucor, Raytheon Technologies, Sherwin Williams, Snap, Texas Instruments, Verizon, and Visa on Tuesday; AT&T, Boeing, CME Group, Coca-Cola, eBay, Edwards Lifesciences, Old Dominion, O’Reilly Automotive, Thermo-Fisher Scientific, and Union Pacific on Wednesday; AbbVie, Boston Scientific, Bristol Myers Squibb, Carrier Global, Comcast, Deckers Outdoor, Ford, Hershey, Honeywell, Intel, KLA, Live Nation, Mastercard, McDonald’s, Northrop Grumman, Royal Caribbean, Southwest Airlines, Texas Roadhouse, Tractor Supply, and Valero on Thursday; and Astra Zeneca, Chevron, ColgatePalmolive, Exxon Mobil, Procter & Gamble, and T. Rowe Price on Friday.

Like I said, a ton of big earnings are scheduled to be released next week. The Fed is widely expected to announce a 25-basis point hike but investors are really more interested in the central bank’s outlook for future moves. Bottom line, next week is going to be jam packed full of market moving headlines.

Investors and traders that have made big returns this year seem happy to trim a little bit of length and to bank some profits.

China and Taiwan

I’m going to be keeping an eye on China and Taiwan. If you recall, it was in August of last year that the Chinese military staged large-scale war games around Taiwan. There’s a chance we could see some fireworks again this August as China is already saying it’s a “priority” to stop Taiwan’s vice president and presidential frontrunner William Lai from visiting the United States next month.

Remember, Taiwan will hold presidential and parliamentary elections in January, with Lai, the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) presidential candidate, the frontrunner in most opinion polls. Many say the Chinese government is looking for a conflict as a way to try and spark Nationalism and reunite their country and also create a distraction from the problems that have arisen inside their own domestic borders. Time will tell…