Morning Preview: May 21, 2026

Early Look

Thursday, May 21, 2026

U.S. stocks are lower following a strong performance on Wednesday as investors digest another earnings beat and strong guidance from AI poster child Nvidia (NVDA) last night, though shares only trade little changed and then new reports coming out of Iran which weakened markets this morning. Oil prices swung following a sharp plunge Wednesday on hopes a deal to reopen the critical Strait of Hormuz might be close. However, Reuters reported this morning that Iran’s Supreme Leader has issued a directive that the country’s near-weapons-grade uranium should not be sent abroad, two senior Iranian sources said, hardening Tehran’s stance on one of the main U.S. demands at peace talks. US futures slipped on these headlines. Meanwhile quantum compute stocks IBM, GFS, RGTI, QBTS, INFQ shares jump after a WSJ report that the US to award $2B to quantum firms and take stakes. There was a big M&A deal in the apartment REIT sector as Avalon (AVB) and Equity Residential (EQR) agree to merge. Deere (DE) reported a quarterly beat in the industrial sector this morning while Wall Street awaits Wal-Mart (WMT) earnings. Also overnight in the IPO space, SpaceX filed for a major IPO that could raise over $80 billion and become the largest in history, while Anthropic recently announced its intentions to go public. In Asian markets, The Nikkei Index surged 1,879 points or 3.14% to 61,684, but the Shanghai Index dropped -84 points or 2% to 4,077 while the Hang Seng Index declined -264 points to 25,386. In Europe, the German DAX is up 107 points to 24,844, while the FTSE 100 is up slightly at 10,436. On Wednesday, the S&P 500 closed up 1.1%, the Nasdaq +1.5% ahead of Nvidia’s earnings report and the Dow topped 50,000 again. Treasury yields are spiking early with the 2-yr yield up 6.6bps to 4.1% and the 10-yr yield +5bps to 4.61%.

• The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 645.47 points, or 1.31%, to 50,009.35
• The Nasdaq Composite jumped 399.65 points, or 1.55%, to 26,270.36
• The Russell 2000 Index surged 70.29 points, or 2.56% to 2,817.36

• 8:30 AM ET                  Continuing Claims…est. 1.785M
• 8:30 AM ET                  Housing Starts M/M for April…est. 1.41M
• 8:30 AM ET                  Building Permits M/M for April…est. 1.385M
• 8:30 AM ET                  Philly Fed Business Index for May…est. 18.0 (prior 26.7)
• 9:45 AM ET S&P Global Manufacturing PMI, May-flash…est. 53.8
• 9:45 AM ET S&P Global Services PMI, May-flash…est. 51.1
• 9:45 AM ET S&P Global Composite PMI, May-flash…
• 10:30 AM ET                Weekly EIA Natural Gas Inventory Data
• 11:00 AM ET                Kansas City Fed Manufacturing for May…prior 10

• Earnings After the Close: BULL CAE CPRT DECK FLO RAMP ROST TTWO WDAY ZM

• RBC Capital Canadian Industrials Conference 5/19-5/21, in Toronto

• Bank of Japan Policy Board Member Junko Koeda leaned distinctly hawkish, laying out a clear, structured economic framework that directly builds a case for ongoing monetary tightening. Koeda explicitly stated that the BOJ needs to keep increasing the benchmark rate. She argued that the BOJ cannot simply “look through” the negative supply shock caused by the Middle East war.
• Japan’s April trade data revealed a substantial rebound, shifting the trade balance into a surplus of JPY236bn, more than doubling that of previous month. Total exports surged by 14.8% YoY compared with 11.5% in March, outpacing a more moderate 9.7% expansion in total imports, vs 10.9% YoY in March.
• The bull-bear spread in the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) weekly survey was 11 11.9% vs +2.7% last week. Bulls fall to 31.7% from 39.3%, Neutrals rise to 24.7% from 24.1%, Bears rise to 43.6% from 36.6%.
• Many Fed officials called for central bank to drop rate-cut signal in April. Minutes from the late-April Federal Open Market Committee meeting showed officials favored a tougher stance on interest rates, with many wanting to remove signals of future rate cuts and supporting further rate hikes if inflation stays above the 2% target.

• Urban Outfitters (URBN) Q1 EPS S$1.30 tops consensus $1.16 and revs rose 11.4% y/y to $1.48B above the consensus $1.45B; Q1 Total Retail segment net sales increased 8.0%, with comparable Retail segment net sales increasing 5.6%; Q1 Comparable Retail segment net sales increased 9.8% at FP Group, 9.3% at Urban Outfitters and 1.9% at Anthropologie.

• Deere (DE) Q2 revs rose 5% y/y to $13.37B well above consensus $11.53B; Q2 EPS $6.55 also above consensus $5.70; reported a net income of $1.77B or $6.55 per share for the quarter, down from $6.64 a year earlier; reaffirms FY26 net income view $4.5B-$5B; said Higher shipment volumes and favorable price realization drove increased sales and operating profit in Small Agriculture & Turf division.
• EnerSys (ENS) Q4 adj EPS $3.19 vs est $2.99 on sales $988M vs est $973.9M, Q4 adj operating earnings $154.1M vs est $148.7Mm; guides Q1 revs $915-955Mm vs est $914.66Mm and adj EPS $2.70-2.90 vs est $2.62; declares a quarterly dividend of $0.2625 per share and sees FY CAPEX of about $70M.
• Nordson (NDSN) Q2 adj EPS $2.86 vs. consensus $2.82; Q2 sales rose 8% y/y to $740.8M vs. consensus $728.8M; Continued strength in demand with backlog up 18% compared to prior year; Q2 EBITDA a record of $235M, rising 8% y/y from $217M; raises FY26 EPS view to $11.30-$11.80 from $11-$11.60 (est. $11.45) and boosts FY26 revenue view to $2.93B-$3.01B from $2.86B-$2.98B; midpoint of Q3 revs also above views.
• SpaceX (SPCX) submits its S-1 last night for Nasdaq IPO. The listing could become the first U.S. market debut above $1 trillion and would immediately make SpaceX one of the world’s most valuable publicly traded companies. Of SpaceX’s three divisions, only the connectivity segment powered by satellite internet unit Starlink was profitable in the first three months of the year. While Starlink generated an operating profit of $1.19 billion, it wasn’t enough to prevent the company from booking a total operating loss of $1.94 billion in the first quarter on $4.69 billion in revenue. Its AI division, alone, accounted for $2.47 billion in losses on $818 million in revenue.
• Star Bulk (SBLK) Q1 adj EPS $0.57 vs EPS $0.52 on revenues $281.2M vs est $219.7M, Q1 adj EBITDA $114.3M vs est $109.7M as voyage revenues reached $281.2M and the board declared a quarterly dividend of $0.50.

• Ares Management (ARES) said its Ares strategic Income fund: launches tender offer to purchase up to 19.8M shares tendered by shareholders.
• Intuit Corp. (INTU) Q3 adj EPS $12.80 vs est $12.57 on revenue $8.56B vs est $8.61B, Q3 operating Income $4.02B: raises FY26 adj EPS view to $23.80–$23.85 vs est $23.22 and FY26 revenue outlook to $21.34B–$21.37B from prior ~$21.0B–$21.19B while seeing Q4 adj EPS $3.56–$3.62 vs est $3.14 and Q4 revenue $4.25B–$4.28B on 11%–12% growth, plans 17% reduction in full‑time workforce with $300M–$340M in restructuring charges largely in Q4 alongside a new $8B repurchase authorization and a $1.20 quarterly dividend payable July 17, 2026.
• Raymond James (RJF) said client assets under administration (AUM) reach record $1.87 trillion in April, up 22% y/y and Assets under management $298.6B as of April 30, 2026.

• Kissei Pharmaceutical said doctors in Japan can again prescribe an Amgen (AMGN) rare-disease drug to new patients, reversing a recommendation made only days ago that clinicians avoid new prescriptions following 20 deaths among people taking the medicine. But Japan’s Ministry of Health instructed the company to include new warnings for clinicians over potentially harmful side effects with the drug’s packaging – WSJ.
• Lower prices for weight-loss pills from Novo Nordisk (NVO) and Eli Lilly (LLY) are prompting patients to switch from compounded medications to branded Wegovy and Foundayo, according to Reuters interviews with nine U.S. doctors.

• Applied Digital (APLD) announced it has entered into a long-term lease agreement with the same U.S. based high investment-grade hyperscaler that previously signed at Delta Forge 1. The agreement is for the Company’s fourth AI Factory campus, Polaris Forge 3, located in a northern state and designed to deliver 300 MW of critical IT load. 15-year take-or-pay leases with the same U.S. based high investment-grade hyperscaler previously signed at Delta Forge 1, valued at approximately $7.5B in base-term contracted revenue, $18.2B if all options are exercised.
• Quantum Compute names seeing strength this morning after the WSJ reported The Trump administration is awarding $2B in grants to nine quantum-computing companies, including U.S. government equity stakes. IBM (IBM) will receive $1B of the package, with GlobalFoundries (GFS) getting $375M. D-Wave Quantum (QBTS), Rigetti Computing (RGTI), and Infleqtion (INFQ) are also expected to be awarded funds. Under the terms of the deals, which still need to be finalized, the government will receive a minority equity stake in each quantum company https://tinyurl.com/33hcnt2x
• Nebius (NBIS) shares jumped on reports the company will raise prices on certain NVIDIA GPU rental platforms, effective June 1, 2026; Roughly ~30% on on-demand (pay-as-you-go) rates across many NVIDIA GPU platforms; Various NVIDIA GPUs including H100/H200 series and newer Blackwell platforms.
• Anthropic expects a 130% revenue surge to $10.9B in the June quarter and its first operating profit; Anthropic generated $4.8B in sales in the first quarter; Anthropic set to turn an operating profit of $559M in the June quarter – WSJ reported.