Stocks Move Higher On Strong Reports From Amazon And Alphabet

Tech Giants Report Strong Quarterly Results

S&P 500 futures are gaining ground in premarket trading as traders cheer solid results from Amazon and Alphabet.

Both companies have easily exceeded analyst estimates on both earnings and revenue as tech giants benefited from trends that were accelerated by the pandemic.

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos decided to step down as CEO. He will be replaced by Andy Jassy who is the head of the company’s cloud division. Interestingly, this news had no impact on the company’s shares.

Both stocks are currently gaining ground in premarket trading. Amazon shares are up by 1.5% while Alphabet shares are gaining more than 7%. The solid performance of tech giants will surely boost Nasdaq and provide support to S&P 500 at the beginning of the trading session.

ADP Employment Change Report Provides Additional Support To Stocks

The U.S. has just released ADP Employment Change report for January which indicated that private businesses hired 174,000 workers. Analysts expected that private businesses would add 49,000 jobs so the report was much better than expected.

The report indicated that the situation in the job market has stabilized which is bullish for stocks. However, some traders would prefer to wait for confirmation of the positive trend from Initial Jobless Claims report which will be published on Thursday and Non Farm Payrolls report which is scheduled to be released on Friday.

Today, traders will also have a chance to take a look at the final reading of the Services PMI report for January. Analysts expect that Services PMI increased from 54.8 to 57.5.

Oil Moves Higher As Crude Inventories Decline

WTI oil managed to settle above the $55 level and continued its upside move after API Crude Oil Stock Change report indicated that crude inventories declined by 4.26 million barrels. Crude inventories continue to decline which is a sign of recovering demand.

Yesterday, many oil-related stocks were under pressure as investor mood was spoiled by BP earnings report, but the continuation of oil price rally will likely provide sufficient support to this segment during today’s trading session.

For a look at all of today’s economic events, check out our economic calendar.