What major decisions, debates, and forecasts emerge from this Global Week Ahead?

The moment traders & investors — and at least one occupant of the White House — have been waiting for is almost here.

The U.S. Federal Reserve is one of a number of major central banks that meets in the coming week to set monetary policy.

Fed Chair Powell and Company’s decision could set the tone for risk markets for the rest of the year.

Next are Reuters’ five world market themes, re-ordered for equity traders—
 

(1) The U.S. Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meets across Tues.-Wed.

The week's main event is shaping up to be a resumption of U.S. monetary easing after a nine-month pause.

Over the past two weeks, bad news on the jobs front and tame inflation readings from CPI and PPI reports have paved the way for the Fed to cut rates by at least 25 basis points after its Tuesday-Wednesday meeting, resuming the easing path that ran from last September to December.

Some Fed officials, including Chair Jerome Powell at the Jackson Hole symposium last month, have been signaling a cut was coming.

The questions have been: when? and how many?

President Donald Trump, for one, believes the answers are something like: immediately, and a lot.

Betting in futures markets suggests a quarter-point cut in the 4.25%-4.5% Fed funds target is all but certain, with a 10% chance of a super-sized 50 bps cut.

By December, at least 75 bps of easing is priced in.

(2) The Bank of Japan (BoJ) Meets on Friday, Sept. 19th.

Whether or not U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is right about the Bank of Japan being behind the curve, a rate hike on September 19th looks like a long shot.

For one thing, Japan won't know who its next prime minister is until October 4 at the earliest, and the front-runners couldn't be much further apart in their views on fiscal and monetary policy.

Sanae Takaichi, potentially the country's first female premier, is an Abenomics disciple backing higher spending and looser monetary conditions. Shinjiro Koizumi, who at 44 would be its youngest premier, is the continuity candidate, close to outgoing fiscal hawk Shigeru Ishiba.

Another complication is potential Fed easing.

A BOJ hike in that environment could roil Japan's already fragile bond market, accelerate yen strength, and knock stocks off their record peaks.

Traders now see a rate hike by year-end as a coin toss, compared with a 72% bet last month after Bessent's last jab.

(3) On Thursday, the Bank of England (BoE) meets. They likely keep rates on hold.

Europe's not missing out on a central-bank packed week.

The Bank of England is tipped to hold rates steady on Thursday, and analysts have pushed back forecasts for future rate cuts, citing sticky inflation.

August inflation numbers are out a day earlier and could add to a sense that further cuts are unlikely soon. U.K. jobs data is released on Tuesday.

Still, the U.K. isn't alone in grappling with higher-than-anticipated inflation that casts doubt over central banks' ability to keep cutting rates.

Norway's central bank also meets on Thursday.

Markets are pricing a roughly 70% chance of a quarter-point rate reduction, but underlying inflation — running at 3.5% year-on-year — makes traders less confident of a move.

A day after the Fed, Thursday's European rate decisions are likely to highlight a growing dispersion among big central banks.

(4) Other central banks meet too: S. Africa, Brazil, & Indonesia are among them.

Several major emerging market central banks also have rate decisions.

Having announced a new and lower policy objective of achieving 3% inflation, central bankers in South Africa will have to re-anchor inflation expectations and might keep rates on hold at 7%, with some expecting there is room to cut soon.

Brazil — having hiked 450 bps over the past 12 months — is expected to keep rates at a nearly 20-year high of 15% on Wednesday. But slowing growth and downside inflation surprises could spark debate on when cuts might start.

Faced with uncertainty over fiscal expansion, analysts are undecided over whether Indonesia's central bank will cut, or keep rates at 5%, on Wednesday after the sacking of respected Finance Minister Sri Mulyani — widely seen as one of the few checks on President Prabowo Subianto's big growth and spending promises that have unnerved many investors.

(5) Gold prices have doubled in the last 3 years. Up +40% in 2025. Up, up, up?

Gold has virtually doubled in value in the space of three years and is up nearly 40% in 2025, set for its strongest yearly gain since 1980's 126% surge. It has beaten even bitcoin, which is up "only" 22%.

A weaker dollar tends to favor gold, as do falling interest rates and lower real yields — those that strip out inflation.

What else favors gold — and has been delivered in spades this year — is geopolitical uncertainty, persistent inflation and a desire to ditch dollars.

The price has vaulted above $3,600 an ounce and a lot of demand is coming from central banks and other buyers with a longer investment horizon.

Not bad for what economist John Maynard Keynes once dubbed the "barbarous relic.”

Zacks #1 Rank (STRONG BUY) Stocks

I picked two major U.S. tech stocks and one major Mainland China stock.

(1) Micron (MU Quick QuoteMU - Free Report) : This is a $151 a share stock, with a market cap of $156.7B. It is found in the Zacks Computer-Integrated Systems industry. There is a Zacks Value score of C, a Zacks Growth score of A, and a Zacks Momentum score of D.

Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Idaho-based Micron Technology has established itself as one of the leading worldwide providers of semiconductor memory solutions.

Through global brands, namely Micron, Crucial and Ballistix, Micron manufactures and markets high-performance memory and storage technologies including Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM), NAND flash memory, NOR Flash, 3D XPoint memory and other technologies. Its solutions are used in leading-edge computing, consumer, networking and mobile products.

A major portion of the revenues is derived from DRAM sales. The company's mission is to be the most efficient and innovative global provider of semiconductor memory solutions.

Micron reported revenues of $25.1 billion in fiscal 2024.

The company has four reportable segments:

• Compute and Networking Business Unit (CNBU): The unit comprises of DRAM and NOR Flash products that are sold to the computer, networking, graphics, and cloud server markets, and NAND Flash products which are sold into the networking market. CNBU delivered revenues of $9.51 billion (38% of total revenues) in fiscal 2024.
• Mobile Business Unit (MBU): The unit comprises Micron’s discrete DRAM, discrete NAND and managed NAND (including eMMC and universal flash storage (UFS) solutions) products that are sold to smartphone and other mobile-device markets. MBU generated revenues of $6.35 billion (25%) in fiscal 2024.
• Storage Business Unit (SBU): The unit accounts for solid state drives (SSDs) and component-level solutions sold into enterprise and cloud, client and consumer storage markets as well as other discrete storage products sold in component and wafer forms to the removable storage markets. SBU’s revenues grossed $4.59 billion (18%) in fiscal 2024.
• Embedded Business Unit (EBU): The unit includes Micron’s discrete DRAM, discrete NAND, managed NAND and NOR products, which are sold to the automotive, industrial and consumer markets. EBU’s revenues logged $4.61 billion (19%) in fiscal 2024.

The company struggles with intense competition from Intel, Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, Toshiba Memory and Western Digital Corporation.

(2) Crowdstrike (CRWD Quick QuoteCRWD - Free Report) : This is a $434 a share stock, with a market cap of $106.6B. It is found in the Security industry. There is a Zacks Value score of F, a Zacks Growth score of D, and a Zacks Momentum score of A.
 

Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Founded in 2011, Sunnyvale, CA-based CrowdStrike is a leader in next-generation endpoint protection, threat intelligence and cyberattack response services.

CrowdStrike’s co-founders George Kurtz and Dmitri Alperovitch were inspired by the shortcomings in the previous-generation security software technologies. They managed to turn the previous-generation adversaries through leveraging the network effects of crowdsourced data from its customer base applied to modern technologies, including AI, cloud computing, and graph databases to detect threats and stop breaches.

In 2011, CrowdStrike built its main cloud native platform leveraging AI — Falcon platform — the industry’s first multi-tenant, cloud native, intelligent security solution that protects workloads across on-premise, cloud-based, and virtualized environments running on a variety of endpoints such as desktops, laptops, servers, virtual machines, and IoT devices.

CrowdStrike’s cloud-based Falcon platform currently provides 29 cloud modules via a SaaS subscription model that is separated under three categories — Endpoint Security, Security & IT Operations and Threat Intelligence.

As a result of its wide-scale offerings, CrowdStrike is one shop for almost all types of security solutions. This provides a competitive advantage over other rivals that have mostly limited types of solutions, such as Proofpoint, which is specialized in identity theft protection; and FireEye and F5 Networks, which offer cloud-based proxy, firewall, sandboxing and advanced threat protection.

CrowdStrike operates in an industry which is characterized by the existence of a large number of patents. Here, hundreds of issued and pending patents for the company’s cloud platform provide a competitive advantage.

The company has adopted a channel-centric sales model that is supported by its direct sales team. The approach helps facilitate client acquisition process, improving account coordination, and developing sales and overall market.

In fiscal 2025, CrowdStrike’s revenues soared 29% year over year to approximately $3.95 billion.

(3) Ping An Insurance Co. of China (PNGAY Quick QuotePNGAY - Free Report) : This is a $15 a share stock, with a market cap of $133.1B. It is found in the Zacks Insurance Multi-line industry. There is a Zacks Value score of A, a Zacks Growth score of F, and a Zacks Momentum score of F.

Ping An Insurance Company of China, Ltd. is engaged in providing products and services in insurance, banking and investment to retail customers and corporate clients. 
It offers life insurance; property and casualty insurance, including motor, property loss, liability, credit and trust, mortgage loan and individual car installment loan; health insurance comprising accident, committed governmental health insurance management, health consulting, and reinsurance; and annuity products, such as commercial supplementary pension and short-term group insurance.

The company also provides trust services; products and services for investment banking, fixed earnings, assets management, securities trading, brokerage, research, and derivate products; and financial futures' business and commodity futures' brokerages, as well as asset hedge service, futures investment consultation, and futures training.

Ping An Insurance Company of China, Ltd. is headquartered in Shenzhen, the People's Republic of China.
 

Key Global Macro

The SEPT Fed rate decisions are the trading week’s key event. A fresh “Summary of Economic Projections” will get lots of media coverage.

On Monday, Mainland China’s retail sales data for August came in at +3.4%, lower than the +3.8% consensus y/y, following a prior +3.7% y/y print in July. That’s weak for this economy, and the weakest pace of growth since November of 2024.

The ECB”s LaGarde gives a speech.

On Tuesday, U.S. Retail Sales for August come out. Annually, the broad retail number is up +3.9 y/y. Consensus looks for +0.3% m/m. The prior reading was +0.5% m/m.

On Wednesday, U.S. Housing Starts (the prior was 1.43M) and Building Permits (the prior was 1.35M) come out.

The U.S. FOMC likely cuts its Fed Funds policy rate 25 bps to 4.08%. Just as important, the Fed’s ‘dot plots’ come out. These are the Summary of Economic Projections for the regional bank groups. There will be a Chair Powell presser, of course.

The Bank of Canada’s (BoC) CPI data comes out for August. The prior broad CPI reading was +2.6% y/y. The prior core CPI was +1.7% y/y.

There is a Bank of Canada monetary policy decision too. 2.75% is their policy rate.

Mainland China’s FDI for August comes out. The prior data was down -13.4% y/y.

On Thursday, the Bank of England (BoE) meeting wraps up. They likely keep a 4.0% policy rate in place.

U.S. weekly initial jobless claims come out. The prior week hit a nearly 4-year high of 263K. The 4-week average is 240.5K.

Australia’s household unemployment rate comes out. 4.2% was the prior data.

On Friday, the Bank of Japan (BoJ) should hold its 0.5% policy rate.

Conclusion

On Sept. 10th, 2025, Zacks Research Director Sheraz Mian published an EPS outlook.

Key points—

(1) For Q3-25, total S&P500 index earnings are expected to be up +5.1% from the same period last year, on +5.9% higher revenues.

(2) Unlike other recent periods, the revisions trend has been positive, with estimates for Q3 modestly up since the quarter got underway.

Since the start of July, earnings estimates have increased for 5 of the 16 Zacks sectors, including Tech, Finance, and Energy.

(3) Q3 earnings estimates have been under pressure for 11 of the 16 Zacks sectors since the start of the period.

The biggest pressure is on the Medical, Transportation, Basic Materials, Consumer Discretionary, Consumer Staples, Construction, and Industrial Products sectors.

(4) The positive revisions trend makes the overall setup for the Q3 earnings season favorable. But it raises the odds of actual results coming up short of expectations. 

In other words, it is reasonable to worry whether expectations for the period are too high.

Enjoy this week, trading and investing!

John Blank, PhD.
Zacks Chief Equity Strategist and Economist