Global stocks mixed; Wall Street awaits corporate earnings

“It will be OK, it won’t be great, but I think we can look forward to better earnings growth in 2016”. The Dow is down 4.2% for the year as of Tuesday’s close, while the S&P is off 2.7% and the Nasdaq is up 1.3%.

In the oil space, Santos is losing more than 7 percent, Woodside Petroleum is down more than 2 percent and Oil Search is lower by nearly 2 percent. (MRK), which closed down 2.5%, and United Technologies Corp. New Zealand bucked the trend, with its S&P/NZX 50 Index up 0.3% in a fourth straight day of gains.

Six of the 10 major S&P sectors were up, with the health index.SPXHC leading the advancers. China’s Shanghai composite index fell 0.1 percent to 3,285.01 while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index shed 0.4 percent to 22,638.05. WTI crude for November delivery fell 44 cents or 0.9% to settle at USD46.66 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

“I don’t think investors really know the direction of the economy”, said Paul Zemsky, chief investment officer at Voya Investment Management, which manages about $210 billion in assets. Chinese trade data showed that imports plunged more than analysts were expecting in September. “The earnings season will help us a little with that”.

Even as the market awaits the first rate hike since 2006, investor focus has shifted to corporate results.

CURRENCIES: The euro rose 0.2 percent to $1.1411 while the dollar slipped 0.1 percent to 119.63 yen.

In corporate action, shares of Molson Coors Brewing Co.

Molson Coors rose 9.2% to US$86 after SABMiller agreed to be bought by AB Inbev for about US$106 billion (RM445 billion).

EARNINGS OUTLOOK: JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citigroup are among the banks that will report third-quarter earnings this week. Stocks are opening slightly lower, breaking a winning streak, as traders anxious about weak Chinese trade figures.

Meanwhile, shares of infant goods retailer Baby Bunting Group are surging 40% on its debut on the stock market.

On Sunday, Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer mentioned the central bank continued to have possibility of raising interest rates this current year, except if global economic circumstances drive the USA economy off target. Concerns about the pace of growth in China, along with uncertainty over the Fed’s policy intentions, sparked a summer rout that wiped as much as $US14 trillion from the value of global equities. The People’s Bank of China announced over the weekend that it will expand a pilot program (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/china-shares-surge-on-fresh-stimulus-plans-from-beijing-2015-10-12) aimed at boosting bank lending, a move interpreted as a version of quantitative easing. There are no top-tier US economic releases scheduled for Tuesday.