Markets continue to follow in last week’s footsteps — selling off the first three days before finding value and going green for Thursday. That’s where we’re at this week: the Dow +0.55%, S&P 500 +1.06%, the Nasdaq +1.77% and the small-cap Russell 2000 +0.64. With the tech-heavy Nasdaq leading the way, we might be tempted to consider the rotation back into growth stocks is back; however, one data point does not a trend make.
The blue-chip Dow 30 had been up as high as 337 points on the day, though, and closed +186. Buying into giants like
Apple
AAPL
helped the index, +2.2%, while the Nasdaq was boosted by
Tesla
TSLA
+4%,
Snap
SNAP
+6% and
NetEase
NTES
+8%. In Snap’s case, the company announced today it has surpassed 500 million monthly active users (MAU) for the first time.
Keeping with the tech theme another moment, semiconductor fabrication supply giant
Applied Materials
AMAT
posted solid fiscal Q2 numbers after today’s closing bell, with $1.63 per share outpacing the $1.51 in the Zacks consensus on $5.58 billion surpassing the $5.39 billion analysts were expecting, representing a gain of 41% year over year. Beating on the bottom line is nothing new for this Silicon Valley company — it has only one earnings miss in the past five years.
What is sending AMAT shares up in late trading is its strong guidance for next quarter: the company now expects earnings per share of between $1.70-1.82, catapulting itself past the current consensus of $1.15. Revenues are now expected to come in at $5.92 billion, well ahead of the $5.92 billion. With much of our current economic growth lag pivoting on microchip availability, a big fiscal Q3 for AMAT may spell good things to come elsewhere, as well.
Deckers Outdoor
DECK
shares are up 6% in the after-market following results from its fiscal Q4 earnings released this afternoon: $1.18 per share jettisoned past the 58 cents expected and the 57 cents per share reported in the year-ago quarter. Revenues in the quarter grew 50% to $561 million — far beyond the $438 million the Zacks consensus was projecting. The company is also instituting a share buyback program worth $750 million.
As we were saying this morning: green shoots. Everyone knows the economy is on the precipice of blasting higher, though inflation concerns and slight employment slack have kept bullish sentiment at bay for the past several weeks. We don’t know what Friday will bring, but if it continues to follow last week, expect another green day by the final closing bell until Monday.
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