Before the Open (May 22)

Good morning. Happy Friday.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed mostly up. China rallied almost 3%, and South Korea and Hong Kong moved up more than 1%. India and Taiwan also did well. Europe is currently mixed. London and Prague are leading to the upside; Norway and Germany are leading to the downside. Futures here in the States point towards a slight up open for the cash market.
Thanks for your votes on my public list at stockcharts.com. Keep ’em coming.
The dollar is down. Oil is down, copper is down. Gold and silver are up. Bonds are up.
With a 3-day weekend ahead of us, today would be dead…but Janet Yellen speaks at 1:00 est. It’s been hard to read the market’s reaction to Fed-related news lately. Is good news good news, or is good news bad news because it means the rates will likely increase sooner rather than later? I don’t see Yellen moving the market a huge amount, but certainly a quick move and counter move (similar to what happened when FOMC minutes were released) is very possible. Day traders can profit off such stuff; swing traders can ignore it.
The market rallied nicely on Monday and has been stuck in a range since. This has produced a decent up week for all the indexes (except the Dow). Overall the small caps are lagging some while the other indexes are near their highs. No complaints. It hasn’t been easy (because of all the up and down movement and lack of staying power), but the overall trend remains up. That’s where my bias lies, but I’m not being aggressive with trades. More after the open.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
General Dynamics (GD +0.66%) was downgraded to ‘Market Perform’ from ‘Outperform’ at Cowen.
Foot Locker (FL +0.80%) reported Q1 EPS of $1.29, better than consensus of $1.23.
Deere & Co. (DE +0.54%) reported Q2 EPS of $2.03, well above consensus of $1.56.
Campbell Soup (CPB +0.49%) reported Q3 EPS of 62 cents, higher than consensus of 52 cents.
British Petroleum (BP +1.95%) was upgraded to ‘Neutral’ from ‘Underweight’ at JPMorgan Chase.
H&R Block (HRB +0.60%) was initiated with an ‘Overweight’ at Piper Jaffray with a price target of $38.
Lockheed Martin (LMT -0.07%) has been awarded a $735.51 million government contract for sustainment of the Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) Defense Satellite Communications System III.
The Fresh Market (TFM -0.27%) reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 50 cents, above consensus of 49 cents, although Q1 revenue of $462 million was weaker than consensus of $473.86 million.
Micron (MU +1.17%) was initiated with a ‘Buy’ at Mizuho with a price target of $39.
Marvell (MRVL +1.63%) reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 13 cents, higher than consensus of 10 cents.
Hewlett-Packard (HPQ +2.30%) rose over 1% in after-hours trading after it reported Q2 EPS of 87 cents, above consensus of 86 cents.
Ross Stores (ROST +0.61%) reported Q1 EPS of $1.37, higher than consensus of $1.28.
Aeropostale (ARO +2.78%) slumped over 15% in after-hours trading after it reported a Q1 adjusted EPS loss of -56 cents, a bigger loss than consensus of -55 cents, and then lowered guidance on Q2 EPS to a loss of -52 cents-60 cents, a wider loss than consensus of -37 cents.
Gap (GPS -0.28%) reported Q1 EPS of 56 cents, right on consensus, although Q1 revenue of $3.66 billion was below consensus of $3.75 billion.
Intuit (INTU +0.75%) reported Q3 adjusted EPS of $2.85, better than consensus of $2.74.
Earnings and Economic Numbers from seekingalpha.com…
Today’s economic calendar:
8:30 Consumer Price Index
1:00 PM Janet Yellen speech
Notable earnings before today’s open: ANN, CPB, DE, FL, HIBB, MENT, TNP
Notable earnings after today’s close: none
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings
this week’s Economic Numbers