The Dow Jones today was little changed in Wednesday's pre-market trading as markets awaited the testimony of U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. Powell will testify before the House Financial Services Committee today. Yesterday, Powell provided commentary on trade, financial regulations, and wage stagnation to the Senate Banking Committee.
Powell stated that markets could expect more interest rate hikes thanks to the considerable growth of the U.S. economy. However, Powell did warn that a long trade war could hurt the U.S. economy. As chair, Powell is required to testify before the House and Senate twice a year on matters relating to the nation's monetary policy.
Here are the numbers from Tuesday for the Dow, S&P 500, and Nasdaq:
Index
Previous Close
Point Change
Percentage Change
Dow Jones
25,119.89
55.53
0.22%
S&P 500
2,809.55
11.12
0.40%
Nasdaq
7,855.15
49.40
0.63%
Now here's a closer look at today's Money Morning insight, the most important market events, and stocks to watch.
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The Top Stock Market Stories for Wednesday
Shares of Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) added nearly 3% in pre-market hours. The gain came after the investment reported strong earnings before the bell this morning. The company's profitability surged 39% year over year to hit $2.44 billion. The company reported earnings per share (EPS) of $1.30 on top of $10.6 billion in revenue. Wall Street analysts expected the financial titan to report EPS of $1.08 on top of $9.96 billion in revenue.
Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) stock is sitting at an all-time high as its annual Prime Day comes to a close. Look for the firm to report some initial results from its yearly shopping holiday. Despite glitches on Monday afternoon, the firm still reported strong sales over its first 12 hours.
Three Stocks to Watch Today: IBM, NFLX, GOOGL
International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM) will lead a busy day of earnings reports. Wall Street will be looking for the company to report EPS of $3.03 on top of $19.66 billion in revenue. The tech giant will report earnings after the bell today.
The European Commission has slapped Alphabet Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOGL) with a $5 billion antitrust fine. The EC says that it violated the law by pushing its own apps on Android phones in order to thwart its competition. The punishment comes after an investigation dating back to 2015.
Shares of Netflix Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) have been rebounding thanks to renewed confidence from one of Wall Street's top banks. On Tuesday, Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) released a note saying that Netflix's recent earnings report offered a "compelling" buying opportunity. Shares had been falling after the firm reported weaker-than-expected subscriber growth in both the United States and abroad. However, BAC says that the company has a history that suggests it "never misses twice" when it comes to subscriber growth. BAC expects that Netflix will surpass expectations in Q3.
Look for additional earnings reports from eBay Inc. (Nasdaq: EBAY), American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP), Kinder Morgan Inc. (NYSE: KMI), Abbott Laboratories (NYSE: ABT), United Rentals Inc. (NYSE: URI), U.S. Bancorp (NYSE: USB), W.W. Grainger Inc. (NYSE: GWW), Textron Inc. (NYSE: TXT), Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. (NYSE: CP), PTC Inc. (Nasdaq: PTC), and Crown Holdings Inc. (NYSE: CCK).
Garrett Baldwin is a globally recognized research economist, financial writer, consultant, and political risk analyst with decades of trading experience and degrees in economics, cybersecurity, and business from Johns Hopkins, Purdue, Indiana University, and Northwestern.