The four major stock indexes look to finish the week relatively flat. The Q1 2026 earnings season is underway, with banks finishing reporting this week. So far, companies are showing signs of growth, with roughly 85% of reported publicly traded companies beating analyst earnings estimates. As for banks, which are a good indicator of the economy, they have also performed well, signaling a promising earnings season ahead. Personnel changes in the tech world made headlines this week as two CEOs of tech giants stepped down from leadership positions. As for economic data, consumer sentiment reported on Friday remains low.
In corporate news, Netflix announced last Thursday that its co-founder and former CEO, Reed Hastings, would be stepping down from the board. Hastings founded the company in 1997, originally as a mail-order DVD rental service. It grew quickly, and in 2000, Hastings and his business partner, co-founder Marc Randolph, offered to sell it to Blockbuster Video for $50 million. Luckily for Hastings, Blockbuster declined the offer, and 26 years later, Netflix boasts 325 million users in 190 countries. Hastings is leaving Netflix at a time when the company has never been in better shape. All things considered, Netflix’s product is still affordable for users with its lowest subscription plan at just at $8.99/month and its most expensive at $26.99/month.
In other corporate news, Uber Eats made headlines this week by adding a new feature. Uber will now allow customers to return retail purchases without leaving the couch. Talk about convenience. Other food and retail delivery companies, such as DoorDash and Grubhub, have minimal return flexibility. With Uber Eats, customers can now have unwanted retail items returned, simply by signaling that a courier pick them up for a small fee. This launch will apply to retailers such as Best Buy, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Petco, and others. This new feature arrives at a time when over 40% of American adults utilize food delivery services more than once a week. My guess is that it is just a matter of time before other food delivery companies follow Uber's lead.
In economic news, U.S. retail sales were reported on Tuesday and came in slightly higher than expected at 1.7%. The main driver of this growth was the sharp increase in gasoline prices, which boosted gas station revenues by 15.5%. The initial jobless claims report came in on Thursday at 214,000, slightly higher than estimates. Consumer sentiment was reported on Friday, coming in above estimates at 49.8, slightly higher than last week's all-time low of 47.6. Uncertainty around the Iran conflict and high oil prices have all contributed to this figure. Consumers also increased their one-year inflation expectations up to 4.8%, from 3.8% in March.
In closing, we turn to the end of an era at Apple, as the company announced on Tuesday that its longtime CEO, Tim Cook, will step down in September. Cook assumed the CEO role in 2011, after Steve Jobs had passed. If Jobs could be characterized as the inventor and visionary, Cook could be known as the incrementalist and manager. Although most of Apple’s iconic creations came during Jobs’ tenure – iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad – it was Cook who incrementally perfected these products and created one of the largest companies in the world by market capitalization. Under Cook’s leadership, Apple also created products and services such as the Apple Watch, AirPods, iCloud, Apple Pay, and others. Apple announced that its new CEO would be John Ternus, the current senior vice president of hardware engineering. Looking ahead to Apple’s future, Ternus seems able to wear the key hats that made the two previous CEOs successful: engineer, innovator, and perfectionist.
Ryan Motsinger
