After A Poor Start To Earnings Season, Looking Ahead To Tech Results

I think we can all agree that this was not a good week for earnings. The bad news from banks kept coming Friday when Goldman Sachs (GS) reported before the bell. The company posted Q4 EPS of $4.38 and revenues of $7.69B, both beating the street, but falling short of the Estimize consensus. The stock was punished shortly thereafter, falling as much as 2.5% after the markets opened, suggesting participants were looking for more. Investors have come to expect big beats from the bank; over the last 4 quarters it has surpassed the Wall Street consensus by an average of $0.83.

As with the other banks that reported this week, downtrodden results for Goldman Sachs had to do with a decrease in FICC trading revenues which fell 29% YoY, with overall revenues for the quarter coming in at their lowest level since Q3 2013, and declining 12% YoY. As a result of sorry results this week, the S&P 500 (SPY) financials sector has seen earnings growth dip to -2.3% from 5.0% at the beginning of the quarter. With that said, there were some bright spots within the sector, with PNC Financial Services Group (PNC), Charles Schwab Corp., (SCHW) and SunTrust Banks (STI) all beating on the bottom and top-line, with the exception of SunTrust which saw revenues come in-line with expectations.

Next week we’ll be looking out for the beginning of the tech earnings parade, with IBM (IBM), eBay (EBAY) and SanDisk (SNDK) all scheduled to report. The IT sector is expected to be the third strongest in the S&P 500 with earnings expectations of 12.2% and revenues of 7.5%.

How are we doing?

Expectations for S&P 500 earnings growth for the fourth quarter stand at 5.6%. Revenues are anticipated to come in with 1.3% growth.

Leaders

Earnings:

Health Care (22.1%). Notable industry: Biotechnology (60.2%)

Telecommunication Services (18.6%).

Information Technology (12.2%). Notable industry: Semiconductors (30.5%)

Revenues:

Health Care (7.9%). Notable industry: Biotech (37.3%).

Information Technology (7.5%). Notable industry: Semiconductors (14.9%)

Laggards

Earnings:

Energy (-18.0%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels (-20.1%)

Materials (-2.7%). Notable industry: Metals & Mining (-6.7%)

Financials (-2.3%). Notable industry: Banks (-4.6%)

Revenues:

Energy (-13.3%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels (­-15.5%).

Materials (-0.8%). Notable industry: Paper & Forest Products (­-17.9%).

Beat/Miss/Match

Earnings: With 36 S&P 500 companies reporting thus far, 57% have beaten the Estimize consensus, 32% have missed and 11% have met. This is compared to Wall Street estimates, of which 69% of companies have beat on the bottom­-line, 14% have missed and 17% have met.

Revenue: 53% have beaten the Estimize consensus, while 47% have missed. For revenues, 67% of companies have beat the Wall Street estimate, while 33% have missed.

Disclosure: There can be no assurance that the information we considered is accurate or complete, nor can there be any assurance that our assumptions are correct.

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