Before the Open (Aug 17)

Good morning. Happy Wednesday.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed mixed, but there were no big winners or losers. Japan and New Zealand did well; Hong Kong and Singapore closed down. Europe is currently mostly down. Germany, Austria, Spain and Italy are down more than 1%; most of the rest of Europe (France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Greece, Poland, Denmark and Finland) is down moderately. Turkey is up. Futures in the States point towards a flat open for the cash market.
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The dollar is up a small amount. Oil and copper are down. Gold and silver are down. Bonds are up.
The market actually posted a moderate loss yesterday. In the grand scheme of things it completely meaningless. It was just a down day within a market that is churning its way up. Now we’ll see if we get two consecutive down days – an occurrence that has only happened once since the Brexit vote.
You can tell I’m splitting hairs here. This is the summer doldrums; nothing is going on. The indexes are making higher highs on a weekly basis. The intraday ranges are small; volume is light. A simply moderate down day gets our attention because there have been so few lately.
Today we get the FOMC minutes from the last Fed meeting. There’s been more chatter about a rate hike in September, so the release will give us a glimpse of what Fed officials were thinking.
Beyond that the market isn’t doing much, and it’s impossible to guess when it’ll suddenly come to life. There are pockets of activity – we’ve gotten off some good trades and many others have been posted on the Message Board – but overall things are slow.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
Target (TGT -0.07%) fell over 3% in pre-market trading after it cut its fiscal 2017 adjusted EPS view to $4.80-$5.20 from a February view of $5.20-$5.40.
Lowe’s (LOW -0.07%) tumbled nearly 7% in pre-market trading after it reported Q2 adjusted EPS of $1.37, weaker than consensus of $1.42.
Mosaic (MOS -1.27%) was downgraded to ‘Neutral’ from ‘Positive’ at Susquehanna.
Pioneer Natural Resources (PXD -0.21%) was rated a new ‘Outperform’ at Bernstein.
Jack Henry & Associates (JKHY -0.52%) reported Q4 adjusted EPS of 84 cents, excluding gain on sale, bet-ter than consensus of 80 cents.
Southern Co. (SO -1.03%) lost nearly 2% in after-hours trading after it started a 32.5 million-share offering.
Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen (PLKI +2.70%) lost nearly 2% in after-hours trading after it reported Q2 compa-rable sales were up +0.7%, weaker than consensus of +1.8%, and reported Q2 revenue of $61.7 mil-lion, below consensus of $63.3 million.
Cree (CREE -2.00%) fell 9% in pre-market trading after it reported Q4 adjusted EPS of 19 cents, weaker than consensus of 20 cents, and then said it sees Q1 adjusted EPS of 10-cents-16 cents, below consen-sus of 21 cents.
Urban Outfitters (URBN unch) rallied 12% in pre-market trading after it reported Q2 EPS of 66 cents, better than consensus of 55 cents.
Dycom Industries (DY -2.89%) will replace FirstMerit in the S&P MidCap 400 after the close of trading, Thursday, Aug 18.
OSI Systems (OSIS -2.74%) gained over 6% in after-hours trading after it reported Q4 adjusted EPS of 55 cents, better than consensus of 49 cents, and then raised guidance on 2017 adjusted EPS to $2.60-$2.90, higher than consensus of $2.42.
Barnes & Noble (BKS -1.04%) said that CEO Ronald Boire will leave and its board determined that he was “not a good fit” for the company.
Wildan (WLDN +0.41%) jumped nearly 7% in after-hours trading after it was awarded a 3-year $35.4 million contract by a “leading” utility in the western U.S. to implement its small business direct install and in-dustrial sector energy efficiency program.
Tuesday’s Key Earnings
Home Depot (NYSE:HD) -0.6% on slowing sales growth.
TJX Companies (NYSE:TJX) -5.8% following weak guidance.
Today’s Economic Calendar
7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications
10:00 Atlanta Fed’s Business Inflation Expectations
10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories
1:00 PM Fed’s Bullard speech
2:00 PM FOMC minutes
Today’s Earnings here
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings
this week’s Economic Numbers