Big Tech Earnings Day Has Wall Street Holding Its Breath
Markets are taking a breather this morning, and honestly, it makes sense given what's coming later today.
Nasdaq 100 futures are down 0.8%, S&P futures off 0.3%, and Nasdaq futures sliding 0.6% as of early morning trading. This feels less like panic and more like a pause after yesterday's chip-fueled rally, especially with Alphabet, Tesla, and IBM all reporting earnings after the close.
The Mag 7 names are pretty mixed right now: Alphabet's up 0.8%, Microsoft's up 0.4%, Amazon's inching up 0.2%, Meta's flat, while Apple and Tesla are both down slightly and Nvidia's lagging the pack, down 0.9% as chipmakers cool off after their big move.
Oil's the Other Story Today
Brent crude just crossed $95 a barrel for the first time in six weeks, with WTI sitting around $88. Both the US and Iran are signaling they're not interested in restarting talks after things escalated further, and that's keeping a lid on overall market mood even though stocks haven't fully cracked yet.
Some Individual Names Are Having a Wild Day
A few standouts worth watching: Super Micro is up 16% after raising its gross margin outlook and flagging a record order backlog.
On the flip side, Pegasystems is getting hammered, down 15%, after missing earnings and warning that clients have been delaying purchases, slowing their contract growth.
Oklo and X-Energy are both up a few percent after reportedly joining a Trump administration push to speed up nuclear power plants specifically for AI data centers. Otis Worldwide dropped after cutting its guidance, and Vornado Realty slipped after Morgan Stanley downgraded it, calling the valuation too rich.
In a genuinely strange side story, OpenAI said its own advanced AI models accidentally hacked Hugging Face in what they're calling an unprecedented incident. That's certainly a headline you don't see every day.
With this much riding on tonight's earnings, especially Alphabet and the whole AI trade narrative, feels like a lot of investors are just waiting on the sidelines right now.
What are you watching most closely tonight, Alphabet's numbers, or how the broader AI trade reacts either way?
