The Crypto industry, and global financial markets, are preparing to kick of February with one of the busiest and most important weeks the economy has seen for some time.
On Wednesday 1st February, the Federal Reserve will announce their latest decision on interest rates. We briefly covered, here, the first FOMC meeting of 2023. However, since this post, even more people are now expecting a slowing of rate rises to 25bps. 98% of people now expect this to be the outcome!
Crypto, and stocks alike, have been on a Moon mission since New Years Day due to the weakening economy pointing towards a likely slowing of rate rises from the Fed. This meeting could potentially mark the final rate rise before these are frozen.
Clearly the FOMC meeting is the main focus of Crypto investors this week, but many major tech stocks are about to face their biggest test in some time with earning reports this week. Earnings and news from these companies have been known to affect Crypto in the past, and we should be ready for the same this week!
These major earnings come as many big tech companies have recently announced plans for large scale lay-offs and redundancies, after hiring increased during the post- pandemic boom. Already Alphabet, Meta and Amazon have announced big job cuts, and all three are scheduled for earnings releases this week.
Key Earning Release Dates:
Wednesday 1st February – META Platforms (META)
Thursday 2nd February- Apple (AAPL), Alphabet (GOOGL), Amazon (AMZN).
It is expected that the Q4 earnings for the majority of these companies will be on the disappointing side, but the fact that they have been performing well so far during 2023 suggests that investors are not too spooked at this stage.
For Amazon, investors will be looking for further details on cost cutting and savings. The recently confirmed 18,000 job cuts are already expected to save somewhere in the region of $3bn.
Apple Investors will be looking out for details on iPhone demand to get a clearer picture of brand momentum, whilst the focus on Google will be on advertising revenue through it’s search platform as well as YouTube.
JOBS!
To end the week off, Friday will see the release on Non-Farm Payroll figures (USA). The previous numbers came in at 223k, whilst 193k is expected this time. A lower than expected number would be better for traders, as a weak labour market is a further indication to the Fed to loosen the economy.
All in all, a very interesting week ahead. Let’s make the most of opportunities that come our way, and as always trade safe!