Back to top

Image: Shutterstock

Biggest Earnings Week of the Season: Key Stocks to Watch

Read MoreHide Full Article

The week of January 30th is arguably the most critical week of this earnings season. Some of the names reporting this week include energy, biotech, and mega-cap tech stocks. Below, we highlight some of the most watched EPS reports of the week:

 

Tuesday 1/31 (Before Market Open):

Exxon Mobil (XOM - Free Report) is set to report earnings before the market opens today. The oil juggernaut is a bellwether in the energy space and will provide investors with clues about how much is left in the tank for the energy group. The stock has been a top performer amid geopolitical events in Ukraine and higher oil prices. XOM has surprised to the upside for two straight quarters.

Zacks Investment Research
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Pfizer (PFE - Free Report) , the giant behind the COVID-19 vaccine, is one of the major beneficiaries of the pandemic. In 2022, the biotech reported record earnings numbers. However, recently, the company has been facing growing scrutiny after the Director of Research and Development divulged to an undercover journalist that the company is weighing purposely mutating the COVID-19 virus in the name of profits. The stock is on a five-week losing streak, and multiple insiders have sold seven figures worth of stock in recent months. Watch how management addresses the recent scrutiny and monitor how the stock reacts post-earnings.

Zacks Investment Research
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Tuesday 1/31 (After Market Close):

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD - Free Report) is a semiconductor leader and one of the strongest challengers to Nvidia’s (NVDA - Free Report) dominance in the graphic processing unit (GPU) market. Semiconductors are on the mend in recent months as the recent popularity of ChatGpt, and other AI platforms are expected to help boost earnings.

Snap (SNAP - Free Report) is the creator of Snapchat, a mobile video application that helps people to communicate through short videos called Snaps. Snap has been on a free fall as Chinese-based ByteDance has taken market share with its competing short video-sharing platform Tiktok. However, there is renewed interest in the stock after Josh Hawley announced he would introduce a bill to ban Tiktok in the United States amid national security concerns. Monday, SNAP showed bucked the market trend and rose. Shares are trying to emerge from a multi-month price structure.

Zacks Investment Research
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Wednesday 2/1 (After Market Close):

Meta Platforms (META - Free Report) , the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, is slated to kick off a slew of mega-cap tech earnings Wednesday. Like Snap, Meta shares stand to benefit from a potential Tiktok ban. Investors will also be watching what CEO Mark Zuckerberg has to say about the bold bet the company is making on the metaverse. Investors have punished shares of META over the past year as the company focuses more on the metaverse and less on its core social media business. Meta has a robust Zack’s Earnings Expected Surprise Prediction (ESP) of 13.39%, suggesting that the social media giant is likely to beat earnings expectations.

Thursday 2/2 (After Market Close):

From a tech perspective, Thursday marks the biggest day of earnings season. Amazon (AMZN - Free Report) , Apple (AAPL - Free Report) , and Alphabet (GOOGL - Free Report) are set to report. Just how big of a bearing do these three names have on tech? The three tech monsters have a combined market cap of over $4 trillion and account for roughly 25% of the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ - Free Report) . All three names are approaching the underside of their 200-day moving averages – a critical price zone to monitor in the short-term.

Zacks Investment Research
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Published in