U.S. consumer sentiment in February stood at 66.4 – the highest since Jan 2022.
The persistent strength in the labour market and the stock market rally in January have likely led to an improvement in consumer sentiment in February.
Among the sectoral gainers, energy stocks climbed over 5% last week as crude oil prices surged after Russia announced a 5% cut in oil production beginning March.
Top stories from last week
- Microsoft (MSFT) unveiled a new AI-powered version of its search engine Bing where users can chat like OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot. Shares gained 2.2% last week.
- CVS Health (CVS) will buy clinic owner Oak Street Health (OSH) for about $10.6 billion. The pharmacy operator also reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue and profit. CVS shares climbed 4.43% through the week.
- PepsiCo’s (PEP) fourth quarter earnings beat market expectations on top and bottom line helped by higher prices for its snacks and drinks. Shared surged 3.76% last week.
The week ahead
- Earnings this week: Coca-Cola (KO), Airbnb (ABNB), GlobalFoundries (GFS), Shopify (SHOP), Biogen (BIIB), Cisco Systems (CSCO), Deere & Company (DE), etc.
- Economic data this week: Consumer Price Index, Producer Price Index and retail sales growth.
- On an annual basis, inflation is expected to cool down to 6.2% in January from 6.5% in December.
Stock watchlist for this week
*Consensus rating and average price target as per Tipranks data.
ETF watchlist for this week
#This content is merely for illustrative purposes and does not constitute investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell securities of any kind.
