Key takeaways:

• While the S&P 500 closed above 5000 points for the first time in history, investors will look to earnings from ASX blue-chip names.

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Economic Calendar and News

These are the major items on this week’s agenda:

• Australian jobs data is on the agenda for the coming days. National Australia Bank is forecasting a minor increase in the official unemployment rate to 4%, despite expecting the jobs market to have added 30,000 hires last month. Westpac is also tipping the same unemployment rate, albeit it has noted caution surrounding the seasonality of jobs data for this time of year.

• In the US, look out for fresh inflation data on Tuesday. It comes as the Federal Reserve looks for signs on whether inflation is showing sustained downwards progress towards reaching its benchmark target. The most recent CPI reading for the US showed consumer prices rose slightly in December, growing at an annual rate of 3.4%.

• Elsewhere, the strength of the American consumer will be examined by way of new retail sales data on Thursday, and consumer sentiment survey data on Friday.

Stocks on Watch

Some of the potential stocks in focus this week include:

• Commonwealth Bank (ASX: CBA) is the major name on ‘earnings watch’ this week, with the nation’s biggest lender due to report its half-year results on Wednesday. The main watch-point here will be the bank’s net interest margins, which previously came under pressure amid intense competition in the home loan market, as well as higher funding costs and whether there has been any changes to bad and doubtful debts.

• JB Hi-Fi (ASX: JBH) is the focal point for Monday’s trading action after releasing its own earnings report. The retailer announced sales of $5.16 billion for the first half of the financial year, down 2.2%, while net profit tumbled almost 20% to $264.3 million.

• Later in the week, Thursday sees Origin Energy (ASX: ORG) under the microscope. The energy giant’s results will be viewed through the lens of a period where electricity prices have declined. Wholesale power prices across the nation’s main electricity market nearly halved by the end of 2023 compared with a year prior.

• A few other ASX earnings to watch include CSL (ASX: CSL) and Seek (ASX: SEK) on Tuesday, AMP (ASX: AMP) and Evolution Mining (ASX: EVN) on Wednesday, followed by Goodman Group (ASX: GMG), Wesfarmers (ASX: WES), Whitehaven Coal (ASX: WHC), and Telstra (ASX: TLS) on Thursday. Insurance Australia Group (ASX: IAG) and QBE Insurance (ASX: QBE) will round things out on Friday.

• In the US, attention shifts to quarterly results from Airbnb (NASDAQ: ABNB), Occidental Petroleum (NYSE: OXY), plus Dow Jones constituents Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO) and Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO). Investors will be monitoring whether Coca-Cola’s recent sales momentum has continued, and whether Cisco can turn around slowing product orders last quarter.