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Steady PCE, Higher Pending Home Sales, Help Bolster Hump Day Trading
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Wednesday, April 30, 2025
Markets fought back from fairly deep in the red as of today’s open, closing mostly mixed across the major indexes: the Dow was +141 points, +0.35%, The S&P 500 +8 points, +0.15%, the Nasdaq slipped -15 points, -0.09%, while the small-cap Russell 2000 lost -9 points, -0.46%. Bond yields had threatened to move higher early in the session, but came back down to +4.16% on the 10-year and +3.61% on 2s.
PCE Remains Steady for March: 0.0% on Headline & Core
The biggest non-employment-related economic report today was the March Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE), which the Fed name-drops every time it discusses what data it’s relying on for answers regarding the economy. On headline month-over-month PCE, this came in at 0.0%, as expected and -30 basis points (bps) below the previous month. Year over year, headline PCE reached +2.3% — a tick above expectations but down 40 bps from the upwardly revised +2.7% for February.
Core PCE strips out volatile food and energy expenditures, but on headline month over month, it made no difference: 0.0%. This was down from the +0.1% projected and the +0.4% reported a month ago. Core PCE year over year came in as expected at +2.6%, down from the upwardly revised +3.0% from the prior month. It’s hard to find steadier numbers than these, and they remain relatively close to the Fed’s optimal inflation level of +2.0%.
Pending Home Sales Highest in 6 Months
After last week’s surprise New Home Sales gains — 724K seasonally adjusted, annualized units easily outperformed the 685K estimate and 674K reported the prior month — Pending Home Sales brought similarly pleasing results this morning: +6.1% for March swept past the +1% expected and upwardly revised +2.1% for February. This is the highest read since 7.5% back in September of last year.
The South did most of the heavy lifting again, surging +9.8% for the month. The Midwest was next in line at +4.9%, with the West up +4.8%. Only the Northeast was in negative territory, at -0.5%. But considering the dire circumstances the housing market has endured over the past couple of years, it’s nice to see some signs of life there.
Q1 Earnings at a Glance After the Close: Microsoft, Meta and Qualcomm
Meta Platforms (META - Free Report) stormed ahead of estimates in its Q1 report out after today’s close. Earnings of $6.43 per share easily outdid the $5.22 expected in the Zacks consensus, while revenues of $42.31 billion surpassed the $41.22 billion estimate. Daily Active People (DAP) grew +6% year over year to 3.43 billion on Facebook, Instagram, Whats App and other social media owned by the conglomerate. The high-end of next quarter’s revenue projection, at $45.5 billion, is far hotter than the $43.3 billion our analysts were expecting.
Microsoft (MSFT - Free Report) also beat on top and bottom lines this afternoon: earnings cruised to +18% year over year to $3.46 billion, knocking out the $3.20 billion estimate and $2.94 per share reported this time a year ago. Revenues of $70.1 billion in the quarter made easy work of the projected $68.4 billion. Azure cloud sales added another +20% to the company’s gains, to $42.4 billion in the quarter. The company has only one earnings miss in the past five years.
Qualcomm (QCOM - Free Report) also outpaced estimates this afternoon in its fiscal Q2 report, beating by 3 cents to $2.85 per share on $10.83 billion in revenues, sweeping past the Zacks consensus estimate $10.67 billion for the quarter. Yet a lower revenue guide for Q3 is sending shares down -6.3% in the after-market.
Image: Shutterstock
Steady PCE, Higher Pending Home Sales, Help Bolster Hump Day Trading
Wednesday, April 30, 2025
Markets fought back from fairly deep in the red as of today’s open, closing mostly mixed across the major indexes: the Dow was +141 points, +0.35%, The S&P 500 +8 points, +0.15%, the Nasdaq slipped -15 points, -0.09%, while the small-cap Russell 2000 lost -9 points, -0.46%. Bond yields had threatened to move higher early in the session, but came back down to +4.16% on the 10-year and +3.61% on 2s.
PCE Remains Steady for March: 0.0% on Headline & Core
The biggest non-employment-related economic report today was the March Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE), which the Fed name-drops every time it discusses what data it’s relying on for answers regarding the economy. On headline month-over-month PCE, this came in at 0.0%, as expected and -30 basis points (bps) below the previous month. Year over year, headline PCE reached +2.3% — a tick above expectations but down 40 bps from the upwardly revised +2.7% for February.
Core PCE strips out volatile food and energy expenditures, but on headline month over month, it made no difference: 0.0%. This was down from the +0.1% projected and the +0.4% reported a month ago. Core PCE year over year came in as expected at +2.6%, down from the upwardly revised +3.0% from the prior month. It’s hard to find steadier numbers than these, and they remain relatively close to the Fed’s optimal inflation level of +2.0%.
Pending Home Sales Highest in 6 Months
After last week’s surprise New Home Sales gains — 724K seasonally adjusted, annualized units easily outperformed the 685K estimate and 674K reported the prior month — Pending Home Sales brought similarly pleasing results this morning: +6.1% for March swept past the +1% expected and upwardly revised +2.1% for February. This is the highest read since 7.5% back in September of last year.
The South did most of the heavy lifting again, surging +9.8% for the month. The Midwest was next in line at +4.9%, with the West up +4.8%. Only the Northeast was in negative territory, at -0.5%. But considering the dire circumstances the housing market has endured over the past couple of years, it’s nice to see some signs of life there.
Q1 Earnings at a Glance After the Close: Microsoft, Meta and Qualcomm
Meta Platforms (META - Free Report) stormed ahead of estimates in its Q1 report out after today’s close. Earnings of $6.43 per share easily outdid the $5.22 expected in the Zacks consensus, while revenues of $42.31 billion surpassed the $41.22 billion estimate. Daily Active People (DAP) grew +6% year over year to 3.43 billion on Facebook, Instagram, Whats App and other social media owned by the conglomerate. The high-end of next quarter’s revenue projection, at $45.5 billion, is far hotter than the $43.3 billion our analysts were expecting.
Check out the updated Zacks Earnings Calendar here.
Microsoft (MSFT - Free Report) also beat on top and bottom lines this afternoon: earnings cruised to +18% year over year to $3.46 billion, knocking out the $3.20 billion estimate and $2.94 per share reported this time a year ago. Revenues of $70.1 billion in the quarter made easy work of the projected $68.4 billion. Azure cloud sales added another +20% to the company’s gains, to $42.4 billion in the quarter. The company has only one earnings miss in the past five years.
Qualcomm (QCOM - Free Report) also outpaced estimates this afternoon in its fiscal Q2 report, beating by 3 cents to $2.85 per share on $10.83 billion in revenues, sweeping past the Zacks consensus estimate $10.67 billion for the quarter. Yet a lower revenue guide for Q3 is sending shares down -6.3% in the after-market.
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