For Immediate Release
Chicago, IL – February 9, 2010 – Zacks Research Equity Strategist Dirk Van Dijk says that S&P 500 earnings are continuing to show red ink. He tracks companies on the Zacks.com web site, naming names, while forecasting trends for the months ahead.
Earnings Season Still Going Strong
With 61.6% of the reports in, this has been a very strong earnings season so far (although one would not know that by looking at the market action). Yes, we had easy comps from a year ago, but 54.25% year-over-year growth is nothing to sneeze at.
While most of that eye-popping growth is due to a handful of firms, mostly in the Financials, even if the financials are excluded earnings growth is still 9.5%. The majority of firms are reporting higher earnings than a year ago. Earnings are coming in much better than expected, with 76.0% of all firms reporting coming in with better than expected earnings, only 16.9% disappointing.
While all sectors have seen more positive surprises than disappointments, Tech has put on an absolutely stunning performance. With 73.6% of its results in, there have been 48 positive surprises and not a single disappointment.
The Tech sector’s strength is being driven by some of the biggest and best-known of the Tech firms. Apple (AAPL), Applied Materials (AMAT), Intel (INTC), Microsoft (MSFT) and Texas Instruments (TXN) all have extremely strong revisions profiles for 2010.
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Contact: Dirk Van Dijk, CFA
Company: Zacks.com
Phone: 312-265-9211
Email: pr@zacks.com
Visit: www.zacks.com
