Stocks closed mixed yesterday with the Nasdaq up 0.46% and the S&P up 0.17%, while the Dow and small-cap Russell 2000 ended lower by -0.48% and -0.33% respectively.

We've got a big earnings week this week with as many as 1,145 companies reporting.

Yesterday, after the close, we heard from Palantir. They posted a positive EPS surprise of 23.5%, and a positive sales surprise of 8.06%. That translated to a quarterly EPS growth rate of 110% vs. this time last year, and a sales growth of 63%. They also guided Q4 sales above expectations by 8%, and their full-year revenue outlook by 6%. They were up 3.35% in the regular session yesterday before earnings (and making a new all-time high in the process), and were trading higher by more than 1% in after-hours following earnings.

We also heard from Hims & Hers Health after the close, and they posted a negative EPS surprise of -40%, and a positive sales surprise of 2.62%. Their 6 cents EPS was flat vs. this time last year, but sales growth was up 49%. While Q4 revenue guidance missed expectations by -2.6%, it would still show a 27.8% growth rate if achieved. They were off -2.35% in the regular session, but were up over 6% in after-hours trade.

Today we'll hear from 389 companies, including Shopify, Uber and Spotify before the open, and Advanced Micro Devices and Arista Networks after the close, to name a handful.

In other news, it was reported that OpenAI signed a 7-year deal with Amazon to buy $38 billion worth of their AWS cloud services. The deal gives OpenAI access to hundreds of thousands on NVIDIA processors, which they will use to train their AI models and run ChatGPT. Amazon last week, after reporting a quarterly EPS growth rate of 36.4%, and a sales growth of 13.4%, soared by 9.58%. Yesterday's news saw Amazon add another 4% and close at new all-time highs.

On the economic report front, yesterday's PMI Manufacturing Index came in at 52.5, up from last month's 52.0 and views for 52.2.

The ISM Manufacturing Index, however, eased to 48.7 vs. last month's 49.1 and estimates for 49.5.

Today we'll get Factory Orders, the International Trade in Goods and Services report, and the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey report (or JOLTS for short).

Today also marks day 35 of the government shutdown, tying the previous record (since 1980) set back in 2018/2019. One more day and it'll officially be the longest shutdown in history.

Hopefully, after crossing that milestone this week, and with the 2025 elections coming to a close, both parties can find an offramp to open the government back up.

Fortunately, the markets have usually ended higher during shutdowns. And that's what we've seen so far with this one. But we are entering uncharted territory. The government can't stay shut forever. And the longer it does, there's bound to be some negative macro-economic consequences at some point, that may not be so easily reversible. Let's hope we don't find out what the threshold is.

Meantime, stocks are trading near their all-time highs with plenty of seasonal stats favoring more gains to come, not the least of which is Q4 being the best quarter for stocks.

Add in the tendency for stocks to go up during earnings season (which we are in the middle of right now), and that also bodes well for stocks.

See you tomorrow,