Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Q2 earnings season begins to ramp up in earnest: transportation major CSX Corp. (CSX Quick QuoteCSX - Free Report) and fast-food giant Yum! Brands (YUM Quick QuoteYUM - Free Report) are expected to release Q2 earnings results after the bell today. Tomorrow, before the market opens, Wall Street finance firms will have begun reporting with JPMorgan (JPM Quick QuoteJPM - Free Report) , BlackRock (BLK Quick QuoteBLK - Free Report) and Progressive (PGR Quick QuotePGR - Free Report) , along with airline major Delta Air Lines (DAL Quick QuoteDAL - Free Report) . Although there are not an immense number of companies reporting, many of these that are represent a notable amount of total S&P 500 market capitalization.

We are seeing slightly positive futures ahead of the opening bell today, continuing the positive run since the bounce-back from the surprise Brexit vote a couple weeks ago and the positive June jobs report last Friday. With no major negative obstacles in the way currently, investors appear to remain in a good mood.

Speaking of Brexit, Great Britain will soon make a quick and tidy change at the helm: current Prime Minister David Cameron, who had called for the Brexit vote in the first place (and had expected the very opposite result), made his final appearance as head of the U.K., and the nation will then make way for his successor, fellow Conservative Theresa May. Ms. May had been quoted following the Brexit vote — as a pro-Remain supporter herself — that “Brexit means Brexit.” No back-door moves to retain membership in the European Union (EU) will be pursued, in other words.

The June read for Import and Export prices have been released before the bell today, with month-over-month results below what analysts had been expecting and much lower than the previous month. Import prices rose 0.2%, beneath the 0.5% expected and 1.4% from May. Export prices fared a bit better, up 0.8% versus 1.2% in May.

Mark Vickery
Senior Editor