© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., July 19, 2023. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
(Reuters) – were subdued on Tuesday, lagging Wall Street peers after the blue-chip index logged a terrific 11-day rally, while investors awaited quarterly earnings from megacap technology companies.
The earnings from Google-owner Alphabet (NASDAQ:) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:), due after the bell, will be a test for their hefty valuations. The megacaps rose 0.7% each in premarket trading.
The U.S. tech giants are expected to signal an end to a nearly year-long slowdown in their cloud businesses as signs of economic resilience encourage clients to boost technology spending, while a pickup in digital ads will also aid their profits.
The tech-heavy Index has rallied 34.3% this year, helped by outsized gains in rate-sensitive megacap growth companies on optimism over artificial intelligence and hopes of an end to the Fed’s tightening cycle.
Visa (NYSE:), Verizon Communications (NYSE:), Texas Instruments (NASDAQ:), Biogen (NASDAQ:), General Electric (NYSE:) and General Motors (NYSE:) are also set to report their results later in the day.
Also in focus is a widely expected announcement of a 25 basis point rate hike by the U.S. Federal Reserve on Wednesday.
At 05:12 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were down 13 points, or 0.04%, were up 6 points, or 0.13%, and were up 56.25 points, or 0.36%.
All three indexes kicked off the busy earnings and data week higher in the previous session, with a jump in oil major Chevron (NYSE:) helping Dow log its longest winning streak in over six years.
U.S.-listed shares of Chinese companies such as Alibaba (NYSE:) and Bilibili (NASDAQ:) added 1.5% and 3.5%, respectively, as investors cheered pledges of support in the readout from an earlier-than-expected Politburo meeting in China.
On tap at 10:00 a.m. ET is the consumer confidence data that is expected to rise to 111.8 in July from 109.7 in June.