Key takeaways:

• Shrinking earnings, margins, and AI demand are expected to be key themes this earnings season

After a stunning rally that capped off the first half of the year, the stock market faces a major test with the second-quarter earnings season for 2023 just getting underway. 

Investors will pay close attention to a parade of results over the next month or so, with reports set to detail how companies are navigating sticky inflation, soaring interest rates, changes to consumer spending, and an uncertain economic outlook.

Here are a selection of the bellwether reports to watch over the coming weeks.

Stock: JPMorgan & Chase
Ticker: NYSE: JPM
Sector: Financials
Date: 14/7
Key Points to Watch: Deposit flows, home lending growth, capital reserves, loan loss provisions

• Stock: Bank of America
  Ticker: NYSE: BAC
  Sector: Financials
  Date: 18/7
  Key Points to Watch: Deposit flows, home lending growth, capital reserves, loan loss provisions

• Stock: Netflix
  Ticker: NASDAQ: NFLX
  Sector: Communication Services
  Date: 19/7
  Key Points to Watch: Media streaming subscriber numbers

• Stock: Tesla
  Ticker: NASDAQ: TSLA
  Sector: Consumer Discretionary
  Date: 19/7
  Key Points to Watch: Price cuts and overall margin levels

• Stock: Johnson & Johnson
  Ticker: NYSE: JNJ
  Sector: Healthcare
  Date: 20/7
  Key Points to Watch: Pharma sales following last quarter’s downgrade, consumer health spin-off

• Stock: Taiwan Semiconductor
  Ticker: NYSE: TSM
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 20/7
  Key Points to Watch: Sales outlook, preliminary report showed better-than-expected sales on AI demand

• Stock: Alphabet
  Ticker: NASDAQ: GOOGL
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 25/7
  Key Points to Watch: Digital advertising trends, cloud growth, YouTube TV subscription growth

• Stock: Microsoft
  Ticker: NASDAQ: MSFT
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 25/7
  Key Points to Watch: AI revenue outlook, cloud growth

• Stock: Visa
  Ticker: NYSE: V
  Sector: Financials
  Date: 25/7
  Key Points to Watch: Consumer spending amid rate hikes

• Stock: Boeing
  Ticker: NYSE: BA
  Sector: Industrials
  Date: 26/7
  Key Points to Watch: New aircraft and forward orders

• Stock: Meta Platforms
  Ticker: NASDAQ: META
  Sector: Communication Services
  Date: 26/7
  Key Points to Watch: User growth and engagement, including Threads, metaverse spending

• Stock: Amazon
  Ticker: NASDAQ: AMZN
  Sector: Consumer Discretionary
  Date: 27/7
  Key Points to Watch: Consumer spending amid rate hikes, inflationary costs

• Stock: Exxon Mobil
  Ticker: NYSE: XOM
  Sector: Energy
  Date: 28/7
  Key Points to Watch: Lower LNG prices and weaker oil refinery margins to significantly impact profits

• Stock: Procter & Gamble
  Ticker: NYSE: PG
  Sector: Consumer Staples
  Date: 28/7
  Key Points to Watch: Consumer behaviours and spending habits, volume growth

• Stock: Caterpillar
  Ticker: NYSE: CAT
  Sector: Industrials
  Date: 1/8
  Key Points to Watch: Margins, demand for mining and energy equipment, pricing environment

• Stock: Pfizer
  Ticker: NYSE: PFE
  Sector: Healthcare
  Date: 1/8
  Key Points to Watch: Covid-related sales, near-term product launches, non-Covid revenue growth rate

• Stock: Advanced Micro Devices
  Ticker: NASDAQ: AMD
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 1/8
  Key Points to Watch: Sales outlook in light of AI interest

• Stock: Airbnb
  Ticker: NASDAQ: ABNB
  Sector: Consumer Discretionary
  Date: 1/8
  Key Points to Watch: Booking numbers for nights and experiences, profitability, free cash flow

• Stock: PayPal
  Ticker: NASDAQ: PYPL
  Sector: Financials
  Date: 2/8
  Key Points to Watch: Consumer spending amid rate hikes

• Stock: Alibaba
  Ticker: NYSE: BABA
  Sector: Consumer Discretionary
  Date: 3/8
  Key Points to Watch: Overall revenue growth, profit margins, cloud growth and AI investment costs

• Stock: Apple
  Ticker: NASDAQ: AAPL
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 3/8
  Key Points to Watch: iPhone demand, services revenue growth, Apple Vision Pro and AI forecasts

• Stock: Block
  Ticker: NASDAQ: SQ
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 3/8
  Key Points to Watch: Consumer spending amid rate hikes

• Stock: Barrick Gold
  Ticker: NYSE: GOLD
  Sector: Materials
  Date: 8/8
  Key Points to Watch: Gold and copper production levels

• Stock: Eli Lilly and Co
  Ticker: NYSE: LLY
  Sector: Healthcare
  Date: 8/8
  Key Points to Watch: Currency movements, weight loss drug progress, Trulicity and Verzenio sales

• Stock: Walt Disney
  Ticker: NYSE: DIS
  Sector: Communication Services
  Date: 9/8
  Key Points to Watch: Media streaming subscriber numbers

• Stock: Palantir
  Ticker: NYSE: PLTR
  Sector: Technology
  Date: 14/8
  Key Points to Watch: Engagement and demand for new AI platform

• Stock: Walmart
  Ticker: NYSE: WMT
  Sector: Consumer Staples
  Date: 17/8
  Key Points to Watch: Like-for-like sales growth, consumer behaviours and spending habits

Costs and Margins

For a number of retailers, margins will come into focus as rising costs continue to wreak havoc for the world’s largest economy. The retailers that are likely to perform best are those that can deliver price inflation that outpaces input cost inflation, ultimately growing margins.

Nonetheless, while input costs have been decreasing of late as inflation cools, the main risk this earnings season is that margins also shrunk as demand cools across different parts of the economy. On the contrary, margin strength will encourage investors to some extent, and could prompt discussion around the effectiveness of tightening monetary policy.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Demand

One of the central themes that first came to light in May when Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) reported its results, and has since been a huge talking point, artificial intelligence has driven much of the rally in US markets over the last six weeks. 

Investors are now anticipating that AI will deliver a huge windfall to a number of companies across multiple industries. In particular, tech stocks have enjoyed a lift, and investors will be searching for signs that businesses see a pathway to monetise or otherwise grow earnings via AI uptake.