By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com -- Stronger than expected retail sales in January may give Federal Reserve policymakers more reason to cut rates more quickly starting next month, but that made for a choppy day in the stock market on Wednesday.
While Russia and Ukraine continued their standoff, fears over a war subsided some more. The U.S. is ratcheting up the diplomatic pressure with threats of severe sanctions if Russia starts a military action.
Retail sales jumped 3.8% in January, a sharp reversal from the prior month. Consumers bought vehicles and other items, but analysts had expected just a 2% increase.
Fed officials were in favor of reining in accommodative monetary policy measures with a faster pace of rate increases and a "significant" reduction in the size of its balance sheet that could begin later this year, the central bank’s January meeting minutes showed Wednesday.
Tech shares sold off on the prospects of faster rate increases.
More data on employment comes out on Thursday with the release of jobless claims for last week. Retail earnings continue with Walmart in the morning.
Here are three things that could affect markets tomorrow:
1. Walmart earnings
Walmart Inc (NYSE:WMT) will declare its fourth-quarter numbers Thursday. Revenue for the period is seen at $151.74 billion and profit per share at $1.49, according to analysts tracked by Investing.com. Analysts will be listening for Walmart’s outlook on supply chains and labor.
2. Nestle earnings
Food giant Nestle SA (SIX:NESN) is scheduled to report full-year 2021 earnings on Thursday, with sales expected to come in around $93.9 billion and net profit expected in the neighborhood of $13.3 billion.
3. Jobless claims
The number of individuals who filed for unemployment insurance for the first time in the U.S. is seen falling for the fourth straight week to 219,000.
Continuing jobless claims in the U.S., a measure of people receiving unemployment benefits for a while, are expected to fall to 1.605 million.
--Reuters and Investing.com staff contributed to this report