Stocks To Watch: Investors Strap In For FOMC, Jobs Day, Amazon Blowback And Election Trades

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Major earning reports will continue to pour in next week with Pfizer (NYSE:PFE), Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) and DraftKings (NASDAQ:DKNG) all due to make the trip into the earnings confessional. All told, about a third of the S&P 500 companies will release earnings across a five-day blitz of numbers. Investors will also have a Federal Reserve meeting and Jerome Powell press conference to digest with the expectation that the hawkish position of the central bank will be confirmed and the target rate will be boosted 75 points. Economic reports due in include updates on construction spending, PMI and factory orders before the week ends with the October jobs report. Analysts will also be busy breaking down the potential implications of the upcoming U.S. election for the market, sectors, and individual stocks as November 8 draws closer.

Earnings spotlight: Monday, October 31 Stryker (SYK), NXP Semiconductors (NXPI), and Avis Budget Group (NASDAQ:CAR).

Earnings spotlight: Tuesday, November 1 Eli Lilly (LLY), Pfizer (PFE), Toyota Motor (TM), BP (BP), Uber (UBER) and Airbnb (NASDAQ:ABNB).

Earnings spotlight: Wednesday, November 2 – Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM), CVS Health (CVS), Booking Holding (BKNG), Humana (HUM), and Yum Brands (YUM).

Earnings spotlight: Thursday, November 3 – ConocoPhillips (COP), Amgen (AMGN), Paypal (PYPL), Starbucks (SBUX), and Moderna (MDNA).

Earnings spotlight: Friday, November 4 – Duke Energy (DUK), Dominion Energy (D), Hershey (HSY), and DraftKings (DKNG).

IPO preview: ASP Isotopes (ASPI), Alopexx (NASDAQ:ALPX) and Beamr Imaging (BMR) are on the list of potential IPOs that could price and start trading, although companies have continued to delay their public launches in the current market environment. IPO lockups periods expire during the week for blocks of shares of Austin Gold (AUST), PepGen (NASDAQ:PEPG), and Kiboko Gold (KIB:CA).

FOMC earnings preview: The Federal Reserve Bank’s policy-making committee is expected to raise rates at November 1-2 meeting and keep a hawkish tone with a steady stream of inflationary data coming in since the September meeting. UBS expects the FOMC to keep its options open rather than provide guidance that the pace of rate hikes is slowing down in December. The firm noted that there are no new economic projections released at the November meeting, so all the action will be in the FOMC statement and the Chair’s press conference. FRB of Kansas City President George is seen dissenting in favor of a smaller rate hike. It was also observed that in recent weeks FRB Vice Chair Lael Brainard has voiced concerns over the pace and magnitude of the global monetary policy tightening underway and FRB of San Francisco President Mary Daly said there at least should be a discussion about slowing down the pace. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell is expected to highlight a wait-and-see stance about the December meeting decisions.

Boeing investor day preview: The world’s largest aerospace company holds a key investor day just a week after seeing its stock post the biggest one-day decline since May. Boeing reported a bigger quarterly loss than expected and noted losses widened amid difficulties in its defense business, while its commercial aviation unit continues to face supply-chain constraints and regulatory hurdles. Revenue grew 4% from the prior year to $16 billion, but missed the consensus estimate by $1.95B. During the earnings conference call, Boeing execs again cut the 2022 target for deliveries of the 737 MAX single-aisle plane to 375 from the low 400s. The investor event is expected to add more color on Boeing’s expectations for 2023 deliveries and the mix of aircraft from the off the line or pulled from storage. In addition, many of the longer-term questions with Boeing are anticipated to be addressed during the investor day to perhaps soothe some investor anxiety.

Holiday shopping preview: The National Retail Federation will hold a media call on November 3 to release its forecast for 2022 holiday retail sales. The NRF forecast will be another key data point for investors sizing up Target (TGT), Best Buy (BBY), Dick’s Sporting Goods (DKS), and Walmart (WMT) following the Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) guidance shocker and amid ongoing concerns around consumer discretionary spending. Bank of America is already out with a forecast that holiday comparable sales will be up 1.3% this year in a rapid deceleration from the +6.5% pace from a year ago. The firm noted that inflationary pressures are weighing on consumer spending, particularly at the low/middle income levels, as nondiscretionary expenses such as gas, grocery, rent are elevated. However, that does not mean that there will not some be some holiday season winners. BofA has Tapestry (TPR) slotted as a top specialty retail top pick on its view that the company has sustainable pricing power and little markdown risk to inventory. In hardlines, Ollie’s Bargain Outlet Holdings (OLLI) and Tractor Supply (TSCO) are called the standouts. Meanwhile, the food and discount top picks are Costco (NASDAQ:COST) and BJ’s Wholesale Club (NYSE:BJ) with their strong value proposition seen supporting continued traffic and share gains.

Corporate events: Wolfspeed (NYSE:WOLF) and Criteo (NASDAQ:CRTO) will hold Investor Day events on October 31. The three-day LA Blockchain Summit begins On November 1 with the cryptocurrency world looking for a spark. Notable speakers include MicroStrategy’s (MSTR) Michael Saylor, SkyBridge Partners Anthony Scaramucci and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. SpartanNash (NASDAQ:SPTN) will host its Investor Day on November 2. Twilio (NYSE:TWLO) will hold a virtual Investor Day on November 3. On the same day, AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) will hold a livestream event with the tagline “together we advance gaming.” The chipmaker plans to unveil the next generation of AMD Radeon graphics and provide details on the new high-performance, energy-efficient AMD RDNA 3 architecture. The week caps off with shareholders with VMWare (VMW) meeting on November 4 to vote on the Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO) merger. Read Seeking Alpha’s Catalyst Watch for a detailed list of events next week.

Barron’s mentions: Visa (V) attracted a bullish recommendation from the publication this week with shares down sharply amid the broad market sell-off this year. Visa has fallen all the way back to where shares were in January of 2020 before supercharged growth in digital payments drove the stock higher during the pandemic. On the plus side, Visa is noted to have impressive free cash flow, no net debt, and continues to be a double-digit sales and earnings compounder. The kicker is that on a valuation basis – Visa looks cheaper than it has been in years. While concerns about a possible recession have cut into sentiment, Barron’s reminded that history shows that Visa continued to grow even through the financial crisis of 2008-2009. The cover story this week called out the potential upside for small cap stocks in a market that is as choppy as it has been in years. Small-cap companies were noted to be mainly domestic, which has helped them avoid much of the effects of the U.S. dollar’s 17% surge against other currencies. Even more important, multinationals are observed to be in an onshoring trend with supply chains in what could end up being a major tailwind for small-cap companies. Stocks from small cap universe mentioned as looking attractive were Veritex Holdings (VBTX), Advanced Energy Industries (NASDAQ:AEIS), Patterson-UTI Energy (PTEN), ChampionX (CHX), AAR Corp, (AIR), KAR Auction Services (NYSE:KAR), Flowserve (NYSE:FLS).

Sources: EDGAR, Bloomberg, CNBC, Reuters