By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com -- Stocks wavered on Tuesday but were trying to stage a rally late in the session as investors awaited earnings from big tech companies like Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Meta Platforms this week.
Alphabet reports after tonight’s closing bell. Technology stocks in general along with growth stocks gave back some of their gains from the previous two days.
Another big tech stock, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), was pressured after a report that the Federal Trade Commission will be reviewing its $68.7 billion deal for Activision Blizzard (NASDAQ:ATVI) and not the Justice Department. The FTC is seen as taking a skeptical view of big tech mergers.
Reuters reported that as of Monday, 172 S&P 500 companies posted fourth-quarter results and three-fourths of them beat analyst expectations.
In addition to earnings, Tuesday data from the Labor Department showed job openings rose to 10.9 million December, beating expectations for 10.3 million. A private payroll report comes out Wednesday and the government’s jobs report comes out on Friday.
Here are three things that could affect markets tomorrow:
1. Job numbers
Private job growth is likely to have decelerated to 207K in January after recording its fastest pace in seven months in December, when it rose 807K. Payroll processing firm ADP will release the data Wednesday at 8:15 AM ET.
2. Meta earnings
Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:FB) is expected to report a profit per share of $3.85 on revenue of $33.34 billion in the fourth quarter, according to analysts tracked by Investing.com. Analysts will be listening to what it says about the outlook for ads.
3. T-Mobile earnings
T-Mobile US Inc (NASDAQ:TMUS)’s fourth-quarter revenue is seen coming in at $21.03 billion and profit per share at 12 cents. Analysts will be listening to what the company says about 5G.
--Reuters and Investing.com contributed to this report