By Kim Khan
Investing.com - Stocks ended sharply lower today with the dour assessment of the economy from Fed Chief Jerome Powell hanging like a dark cloud over Wall Street from the opening bell.
Bulls will be hoping that tomorrow employment data will show continued improvement to counter the nervousness about the reopening of local economies across the country.
Along with the weekly unemployment figures, there will be earnings from the chip equipment sector and yet more insight from Fed officials.
Here are three things that could move the markets tomorrow.
1. Jobless Claims Expected to Dip From Last Week
While the numbers of newly unemployed are still increasing, those long the market will be looking for the trend of diminishing gains to continue.
The Labor Department will issue its report on weekly jobless claims at 8:30 AM ET (12:30 GMT).
Claims for first-time unemployment benefits are expected to come in at 2.5 million, down from about 3.17 million the week before.
This week Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) analysts revised their peak estimate for the U.S. jobless rate to 25%, up from 15%.
2. Applied Materials to Report
Tech stocks have lost some of their momentum in trading this week. But tomorrow investors will get some numbers from the semiconductor sector that could give investors more clarity.
Chip equipment maker Applied Materials (NASDAQ:AMAT) will report earnings after the bell.
On Monday B. Riley FBR boosted its price target on the stock to $56 from $53, but was cautious on upcoming results.
“(W)e expect AMAT to follow ASML, (KLA-Tencor (NASDAQ:KLAC)) and (Lam Research (NASDAQ:LRCX)) in noting a constructive (calendar 2020) outlook overall, but we suspect the spending view could tick down from $57.5B toward $52.5B to $55.0B to account for selectively reduced forecasts and potential for others to drift into (2021) as (Intel (NASDAQ:INTC)) warned,” analyst Craig Ellis said in a research note, according to Briefing.com.
Applied Materials is expected to report a profit of 94 cents per share on revenue of about $4.1 billion, according to forecasts compiled by Investing.com.
The company withdrew its guidance due to the Covid-19 pandemic on March 23.
3. More From the Fed Heads
It’s been an exciting week for Fed followers and there’s more to come tomorrow as two more Fed officials will be speaking.
At 1:00 PM ET (17:00 GMT) Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari will participate in discussion on “Our Economy and Health in Crisis”.
You can watch the discussion here.
At 6:00 PM ET (22:00 GMT), Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan will participate in a panel discussion and Q&A with Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson.