Markets enjoyed a strong week with the S&P 500 gaining 1.33% overall and the tech-heavy NASDAQ rising 2.71%. Meanwhile, meme/retail fueled Digital World Acquisition Corp (DWAC) pulled back from highs after reaching more than $170 last week but still remains nearly $70.
Facebook also announced a name change in a major move. The company will now be know officially as "Meta" and will change its ticker to “MVRS”.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg surprised millions when he didn’t reveal the name had been Skynet all along.
Outside of more meme trends such as Shiba Inu coin's rise, another heavy batch of earnings was released this week with some disappointing results from major companies due partly to continued supply chain disruptions.
Earnings
Some of the absolute biggest names reported quarterly earnings this week with the likes of Amazon (AMZN), Apple (APPL), Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOG), Facebook (FB), and many others reporting. After a strong start from big banks this earnings season, big tech cooled things off a little this week with Apple, Facebook, and Amazon all missing on revenue projections. Meanwhile, Alphabet beat out estimates pretty easily while Microsoft came in just above expectations.
Investors had grown increasingly worried over the effects of Apple’s recent policy changes on advertising revenue for social media sites but Facebook’s report dampened those concerns with many pointing to Snap Inc.'s over-reliance on third-party data as the biggest reason for its earnings flop.
Perhaps the biggest narrative around some of the disappointing results though were the effects from continued global supply chain challenges. Apple and Amazon both cited this as primary reasons for concern with Amazon lowering its future guidance as a result.
Economic Data
In addition to earnings results, plenty of economic data was released this week. The Fed’s preferred measure of inflation, PCE Prices, rose in line with expectations for a 0.3% increase and 0.2% rise in core PCE Prices in September. August saw both measurements rise 0.3%.
Meanwhile, personal income came in below estimates for a 0.2% decline with a sharp 1.0% drop. Alternatively, personal spending rose 0.6% compared to estimates for a 0.4% increase in September.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the third quarter came in slightly below estimates with 2.0% growth compared to the expected 2.4% rise.
Finally, initial claims dropped from 291,000 to 281,000 claims as continued claims also managed to fall from 2.48 million to 2.24 million. Those new claims numbers are finally coming closer to the roughly 200,000 weekly average before the pandemic hit.
All in all, the S&P 500 rose 1.33%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.40%, and the NASDAQ grew 2.71%.
