There will be a decent amount of economy-related data releases this week, but investors will likely focus on a number of large-cap corporate earnings from the diversified financial services companies and the banks.
First came the surging volatility in March, then the bears came out as economists across the board started lowering their estimates for U.S. GDP in the first quarter of 2018. While we might have avoided an actual war with North Korea and a trade war with China for the time being, the economic fundamentals aren’t looking as pretty as they did at the end of 2017 anymore.
Retail sales continued to drop in the last three months and if it slips once again in March in spite of record-high consumer confidence, that will register as a pretty bad signal for the U.S. economy. On the other hand, some better-than-expected banking sector earnings could prompt bulls to take control by midweek.
To sum up, we have the ingredients for a volatile week and unless there are optimistic economic data to support above-average GDP growth in Q1, it may not be a pretty week for short-term investors.
Check out last week’s Market Glance here, in which investors focused on Citigroup’s last quarterly earnings report.
