Traders wait for insurance marketplace Accelerant to begin trading during the company’s IPO at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., July 24, 2025.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Choose a comfortable seat and grab your popcorn. These five days will basically be the Olympics for market watchers:
- Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple are reporting earnings.
- The U.S. Federal Reserve’s rate-setting committee is meeting.
- The personal consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred inflation reading, comes out.
- U.S. jobs data for July will be released.
And looming over all those financial and macroeconomic events is U.S. President Donald Trump’s August 1 deadline for his new tariffs.
As Kim Forrest, founder at Bokeh Capital, said, “What isn’t happening in this week?”
Here’s the ideal scenario for investors.
The Magnificent Seven companies reporting earnings this week and the U.S. economy secure gold at their respective events. (The Fed is expected to keep rates unchanged — whether this qualifies the central bank for a medal is up for debate).
Big trading partners of the U.S., such as South Korea and India, secure a deal with the White House and join the European Union and Japan at the podium, while Beijing extends its tariff suspension with Washington.
If those events happen, U.S. stocks will probably have legs clear hurdle after hurdle — and the S&P 500 can continue topping record tables.
— CNBC’s Sarah Min contributed to this report
What you need to know today
Trump announces a trade agreement with the European Union. Most European goods, including cars, exported to the U.S. will face a 15% tariff, Trump said Sunday. The bloc also agreed to purchase $750 billion worth of U.S. energy, he added.
The Fed is ready to start lowering rates, Trump said. On Friday, the U.S. president said Fed Chair Jerome Powell told him “the country is doing well,” which Trump took to mean “he’s going to start recommending lower rates.” Futures markets disagree.
Perfect week for the S&P 500. The broad-based index rose Friday to close at a high — its fifth record in a row last week. The Nasdaq Composite and Dow Jones Industrial Average also advanced. The Stoxx Europe 600 lost 0.29%.
Palantir joins rank of top 20 most valuable U.S. companies. After rising more than 2% on Friday to hit a market cap of $375 billion, Palantir bumped Home Depot out of the list. The software provider has more than doubled in value this year.
[PRO] Keep an eye on these overbought stocks. Using CNBC Pro’s stock screener tool, the team has identified 18 stocks that might be trading at levels higher than their fair value, based on their 14-day relative strength index.
And finally…
U.S. President Donald Trump talks to reporters after touring the Federal Reserve’s $2.5 billion headquarters renovation project on July 24, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Chip Somodevilla | Getty Images
Under Trump, Uncle Sam is becoming an active investor
The Trump administration has taken direct stakes in companies on a scale rarely seen in the U.S. outside wartime or economic crisis, pushing a Republican Party that traditionally championed free-market capitalism to embrace state intervention in industries viewed as important for national security.
More interventions could be on the horizon as the Trump administration develops a policy to support U.S. companies in strategic industries against state-backed competition from China.
— Spencer Kimball