With Alcoa set to announce its second quarter earnings tomorrow, earnings season will officially begin. While Alcoa is the first Dow component to report, it is not the best harbinger of the season to come. Over the past 12 quarters, it has only beaten analyst estimates 42% of the time and has missed 50% of the time. This compares to the rest of the Dow, which beat 67% of the time and missed only 19% of the time.
As of yesterday, 5% of the S&P have already reported. The number of reports coming in will begin to ramp up next week. The current blended (reported and estimated) growth rate for Q2 2009 is now -35.6% according to Thomson Reuters. All 10 sectors in the S&P 500 are expected to decline this quarter. Here's a look at what analysts are expecting.
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Sample Upcoming Earnings Reports ()
July 7: Alcoa (AA), Family Dollar Stores (FDO), Pepsi Bottling (PBG)
July 8: 3Com (COMS), Chevron (CVX)
July 14: Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Intel (INTC), Yum! Brands (YUM)
July 15: Abbott Labs (ABT), Gannett (GCI), Grainger (GWW)
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