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Market Slips Again as Q1 Earnings Roll On

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Wednesday, April 17th, 2024

Tell me if this sounds familiar: market indices couldn’t hold onto morning gains. That’s what happened again today, when the Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq and Russell 2000 all came in at the opening bell in the green, only to see trading slip away and close near session lows. There was a slight reprieve just ahead of the 3:00 hour, but the Dow wound up -0.12%, the S&P 500 -0.58%, the small-cap Russell 2000 -0.98% and the Nasdaq -1.51%. It’s now the fourth-straight day lower on the S&P and Nasdaq.

Clearly, the market is still digesting its new interest rate outlook. After three 25 basis-point (bps) cuts were baked into the cake (with hopes there would be more), since last week’s hotter CPI report, it’s become obvious that three cuts will be harder to obtain, especially if there is no cut for June and with the September meeting just six week’s before the November General Election. Economic prints to be released will help add some color to the proceedings, as will Q1 earnings reports over the next month.

Speaking of Q1 earnings, Las Vegas Sands (LVS - Free Report) has reported after today’s close. The casino and entertainment giant outpaced estimates by 4 cents to 66 cents per share in the quarter, with $2.96 billion a smidge ahead of the $2.94 billion in sales, for +39.6% growth year over year. This marks the third earnings beat in the last four quarters, thanks to a rebound in the Macau business. Prior to this, the Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) posted nine earnings misses in the previous 12 quarters. The Chinese business means a lot to LVS.

Transportation major CSX (CSX - Free Report) also marginally beat estimates on both top and bottom lines. Earnings of 46 cents per share edged out the Zacks consensus by a penny (though 2 cents lower than the year-ago quarter) on $3.68 billion in quarterly revenues, just north of the $3.65 billion expected. Total volumes were up +3% year over year, while Operating Income is down -8% from Q1 2023 figures. No forward guidance was given in the company’s press release after Wednesday’s market close, but shares are up a tad in late trading.

New York office REIT SL Green Realty (SLG - Free Report) also reported Q1 results after the bell. Funds from operations (FFO, a real estate metric used, instead of earnings per share) reached $3.07 for the quarter, well ahead of the Zacks consensus $2.17 — and double the $1.53 FFO reported in the year-ago quarter. Full-year FFO guidance ramped up to a range of $7.35-7.65 from a previously derived $6.06 FFO, and shares are up +3.6% in after-hours trading for the Zacks Rank #2 (Buy)-rated company at this time.

Before the market opens tomorrow, we’ll hear from a slew of other companies regarding quarterly earnings, including homebuilding major D.R. Horton (DHI - Free Report) , which is expected to grow earnings +13.2% on +3.7% higher revenues year over year. After Thursday’s close, Netflix (NFLX - Free Report) will try to bounce back from an earnings miss last quarter and gain +56.6% on its bottom line, +13.5% on the top. We’ll also see Initial and Continuing Jobless Claims, Philly Fed manufacturing and Existing Home Sales.

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