Ahead of Wall Street - May 18, 2012

Friday, May 18, 2012

Disconcerting headlines about Greece and the Spanish banking system have kept investors nervous in recent days, a trend that will likely remain with us for a while. After all, the questions raised by the recent indecisive Greek elections about the country’s place in the Euro-zone can only be answered by another round of voting in the coming weeks. Till that time, Greece related questions will likely remain the primary headwind for the markets.

But investors in the U.S. are holding a big party today to forget all about Greece and Europe, even if it’s only for a single day or a few hours. The party is for Facebook (FB - Analyst Report), where the iconic social-networking site will get the biggest tech IPO in history title. The event has protagonists on both sides, with detractors questioning the market’s willingness to give the company a $100 billion-plus valuation. It is hard to escape the feverish debate surrounding the Facebook event anywhere you look. But while the saturation coverage is becoming a little too much, I nevertheless prefer this over Greece and Europe any time.

The Faccebook story is the biggest corporate news of the day, given the absence of any major economic or earnings reports. But we did have a number of major earnings reports after the close on Thursday when we got better than expected results from Gap (GPS - Analyst Report) and Salesforce.com (CRM - Analyst Report), while results from Autodesk (ADSK - Analyst Report) proved underwhelming. Hibbet Sports (HIBB - Analyst Report) posted better than expected results this morning and raised guidance for the rest of the year.

Sheraz Mian
Director of Research