Stocks lost a little ground today as oil weighed on the indices. The Dow 30 was off by 23, the S&P 500 lost 3, and the Nasdaq 100 lost 4. Earnings remain in focus as there is little scheduled news to wrap up the week.
Tesla (TSLA ) after a small delay, announced that it will install hardware in all new cars so that they can drive themselves. Don't get too excited just yet though. The software necessary for the system to work won't be ready for some time. Tesla said that they expect to roll out the software starting in December as long as regulators approve it. Elon Musk said that his goal is to demonstrate a vehicle traveling in fully autonomous mode from LA to New York by the end of next year. Investors weren't that impressed with the announcement after all the buildup and shares lost 2.19% today on the news.
American Express (AXP ) enjoyed a large 9.03% gain today as the credit card issuer raised its earnings outlook for the year. After reporting earnings and revenue that topped analysts' estimates investors jumped at the opportunity to get long. According to their report, they benefited from card fees and spending by card holders in the third quarter. The only blemish on the report was that earnings and revenue fell from a year ago. This was attributed to the ending of the exclusive deal with Costco (COST ).
Mattel (MAT )also enjoyed a nice gain today (+6.01%) after the company announced third quarter revenue that was slightly better than expected. Analysts noted that their sales numbers were little changed from a year ago, but focused on the popular brands like Barbie and American Girl which enjoyed strong sales growth. Barbie sales jumped about 16% from a year ago, while sales of American Girl products increased 14%.
Microsoft (MSFT ) will get their moment in the sun today as the company will report quarterly results after the close. Analysts want to see if their big bet on the cloud will continue to pay off. Wall Street is looking for a profit of $0.68 a share. That's up a penny from a year ago. Revenue is estimated to come in flat from a year ago at $21.7 billion.