U.S. stocks look set to start Monday on the back foot ahead of key inflation data and earnings reports later in the week.
Fears over rising COVID-19 cases and vaccination problems, after a Chinese government official said the effectiveness of its vaccines was low, has put equity markets under pressure.
However, the partial reopening of the U.K. and upbeat comments from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell provided some positivity. Investors will also be awaiting consumer price data on Tuesday and earnings from major banks JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo later this week.
After a delay on Friday, the U.S. Labor Department said the producer-price index, a key measure of inflation, rose 1% in March — the biggest annual increase since 2011.
In our call of the day, Goldman Sachs strategists said higher inflation was on the cards in the coming months, which could boost companies with high pricing power.
“‘Don’t fight the Fed’ is a quip investors have learned to ignore at their peril. What the central bank wants is usually what it gets, sooner or later,” the strategists said, noting that the Fed’s intervention a year ago sparked the 80% rally that has lifted the S&P 500
SPX,
+0.77%
to an all-time high. The index has rallied 10% year-to-date and now trades at Goldman’s midyear target of 4,100 — the bank’s end-year target implies a gain of 5%.
The Fed now wants higher inflation, they said. The investment bank’s economics team expected inflation readings to climb in the coming months, peaking at 2.3% in April, before sitting below 2% until 2023.
When it comes to the impact on stocks, Goldman said it was all about margins, adding that some companies were protecting margins by passing higher costs along to their consumers.
The strategists, led by David Kostin, said companies with low pricing power have historically outperformed when S&P 500 profit margins are expanding. In contrast, companies with high pricing power have “sharply lagged” during the past year. However, rising inflation could mean that is about to change, and companies with high pricing power are set to benefit, the strategists said.
Goldman screened for stocks with high pricing power — high and stable gross margins relative to sector peers. The screen produced 55 stocks, including videogames company Activision Blizzard
ATVI,
-0.70%,
tobacco giant Philip Morris
PM,
+1.82%,
consumer-goods companies Colgate-Palmolive
CL,
+0.18%
and Procter & Gamble
PG,
-0.65%,
and drug manufacturer Zoetis
ZTS,
-0.09%.
Technology companies, such as Aspen Technology
AZPN,
-0.64%,
Adobe
ADBE,
+0.84%
and Oracle
ORCL,
+0.40%,
and retailers Etsy
ETSY,
+1.48%
and Dollar General
DG,
-0.26%
also featured.
Separately, with first-quarter earnings seasons getting under way next week, Goldman expected aggregated sales growth of 5% and earnings per share (EPS) growth of 19%. But that won’t matter much, its strategists added. “The trajectory of the economic recovery will continue to make backward-looking metrics less relevant for the forward-looking market,” they said.
The next issue dominating investor discussions is President Joe Biden’s plan to boost corporate tax to 28%, Goldman said. The full adoption of Biden’s proposals would see 2022 annual S&P 500 EPS growth of 12% fall to just 5%, they added.
The tweet
Higher producer prices are positively linked to S&P 500 earnings, according to this chart from Jeroen Blokland, senior portfolio manager at Robeco Asset Management.
The markets
U.S. stock futures
ES00,
-0.08%
NQ00,
-0.19%
pointed lower early on Monday, with Dow futures
YM00,
-0.10%
implying a 40-point loss for the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
+0.89%
at the open. European stocks also nudged lower in early trading, while Asian markets slipped overnight as investors monitored rising coronavirus cases and slow vaccination rollouts.
The buzz
Powell said “it will be a while” before the central bank taps the brakes on the economy, in an interview on “60 Minutes” on Sunday.
Tech giant Microsoft
MSFT,
+1.03%
is in advanced talks to buy speech-recognition company Nuance Communications
NUAN,
+0.80%
in a deal valued at about $16 billion, according to multiple reports on Sunday.
Pub gardens, hair salons, gyms and nonessential shops will open in England on Monday for the first time since early January, as the U.K. takes the next step on its path to reopening.
Alibaba
9988,
+6.51%
shares surged 7% in Hong Kong trading after the e-commerce giant was fined a record $2.8 billion by China’s antitrust watchdog. The company’s American depositary receipts
BABA,
-2.16%
were more than 6% higher in premarket trading.
Italian diagnostic specialist DiaSorin
DIA,
+8.56%
announced a deal to buy COVID-19 testing kit maker Luminex Corp.
LMNX,
+2.08%
for around $1.8 billion.
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