Beat the street: chips and geopolitics likely to move trader sentiment ahead of earnings

(Partial Video Transcript)

Chip rally could lift US stocks

Hello, I'm Angeline Ong and welcome to beat the street, the show that gives you all the tradeable news and data you need ahead of the Wall Street Open.

Coming up, buoyant chips: a global rally in chip stocks could lift US stocks and certainly we're seeing indications of the main indices ticking higher. Back in focus, crude heading for a weekly gain on the back of the Middle East tensions.

Also, US oil output disruptions are underpinning the price of crude and the dollar. The greenback is on track to rise a second straight week, leaving gold facing its worst week in six.

We'll be checking in with Jeremy Naylor, who will be with me in just a second to go through the commodities markets. Good afternoon. I'm Angeline Ong and welcome to this new edition of beat the street.

Nasdaq within a whisker of another all-time high

Not long now before Wall Street starts trading, let's just take a look at the equity markets, if we may. They are looking like they are extending gains, as you can see here. And the Nasdaq within a whisker of another all-time high.

These indices are pushing higher despite all this talk about recalibration, despite expirations, and also amid this wait for what the Federal Reserve (Fed) is going to do next in terms of the timing of this interest rate cuts.

Certainly, data points that we've seen recently suggest a strong US economy, and that has meant that the market has dialed back on these expectations of a timing for the rate cuts and they have been easing.

But we are still looking at the markets expecting a first rate cut from the Fed in March. Now, speaking of recalibration, earlier on in the week, I caught up with John Stolzfus from Oppenheimer Asset Management and asked him what he made of this change in mood in the markets.

The recalibration that is occurring after a massive rally and lots of capitulation action in the fourth quarter of last year by bears is a reassessment of things of what was carrying that run up, how much it may have positioned the market slightly ahead of itself, we think are now in a process of rebound.

First, we saw some profit taking, some rebalancing within portfolios as technology had gotten a larger share than many thought would be ripe for getting into this year. And of course, the idea that some corners of the market had early to do, thinking that the Fed could cut rates as much as five or six times, we've not been in that camp.

Now, just taking you through some of the stocks that we are watching for you. iRobot, not one that trades all sessions, but you can trade it when the cash session opens. That one in view of the European Union anti-trust regulator said it was planning to block Amazon's $1.4 billion buyout of the Roomba vacuum maker.

Also looking to the skies, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) just recently, in the last few hours actually, saying it will investigate the Atlas Air Boeing cargo plane, emergency landing, also not to be discounted.

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