Here are the 5 big things we're watching in the stock market this week

CNBC Finance

10 min read

The gravitational pull of Nvidia will dominate Wall Street this week â but the AI chipmaker's earnings report won't be the only thing that matters to our portfolio. We'll also hear from Salesforce , a battleground position swept up in the software-stock carnage; two retailers in Home Depot and TJX Companies on the heels of the Supreme Court's tariff ruling ; and Qnity Electronics , the exciting DuPont spin-off that makes materials vital to semiconductor manufacturing and the packaging required for advanced AI chips. Meanwhile, the economic calendar is on the lighter side, aside from the January wholesale inflation report. 1. Nvidia will report its fiscal 2026 fourth-quarter Wednesday night, giving investors a critical update on the state of the AI buildout through the lens of the dominant provider of data center chips and other technology. As of Friday, Wall Street is expecting Nvidia to report quarterly revenues of $65.87 billion, implying roughly 67.5% annual growth, and earnings per share of $1.53, up 72% from a year ago, according to LSEG. Nevertheless, its fiscal 2027 first-quarter sales guidance will likely go a long way in determining the market reaction, as investors consider how much of the roughly $700 billion in hyperscaler capex this year will flow into Nvidia's coffers. Its gross margin outlook will also come under scrutiny amid soaring memory costs across the industry. Even if Nvidia has supply agreements for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) in place to mitigate near-term impacts, analysts may seek insight into the company's long-term plan to maintain gross margins in the mid-70% range, an important level for investors . For the current quarter, the Street is looking for revenue of $71.7 billion and a 75% gross margin, according to LSEG. Elsewhere, investors want an update on Nvidia's backlog visibility. In late October, CEO Jensen Huang surprised investors when he disclosed $500 billion worth of orders for its Blackwell and Rubin chips and networking equipment through calendar 2026. Then, at an industry conference in early January, CFO Colette Kress said that $500 billion "has definitely gotten larger." Ideally, we'll learn just how much larger it's become, particularly in light of Meta Platforms' multibillion-dollar chip commitment. Other topics on our watchlist: a potential resumption of China revenues, its product roadmap, and the competitive landscape against the likes of Alphabet with its TPUs and AMD with its forthcoming Helios server, a direct response to Nvidia's success selling "rack scale" solutions. 2. The second biggest report of the week is Salesforce, on Wednesday night. Who timed that one? The enterprise software giant's quarterly numbers will be important â the LSEG consensus is for EPS of $3.04 on revenue of $11.16 billion â but not as important as what CEO Marc Benioff and other executives say about AI and, more specifically, adoption of its Agentforce offering. The company's remaining performance obligation result will be closely scrutinized to determine whether it supports management's bullish narrative or the bearish view that customers are looking internally to develop their own solutions. This is a very difficult setup. There's no way around it. The issue plaguing Salesforce isn't so much the immediate concerns about disruption; the business isn't going away overnight. The concern is whether, in the long term, customers will be able to give up their Salesforce subscriptions in favor of in-house tools coded with AI assistance, or eventually hand their businesses over to a crop of AI-native software startups that can undercut Salesforce on price. Investors will be looking for management to explain why that won't be the case and why Salesforce will remain a crucial enterprise tool in the AI era. As a result, it's the conference call that will determine where this stock goes next, even more so than usual, and likely even more so than the guidance, because investors' concerns extend well beyond this year. 3. Fresh off the Supreme Court tariff ruling, retailers Home Depot and TJX Companies are reporting at convenient times. Home Depot is up first on Tuesday morning, with the Street looking for earnings of $2.54 per share on revenue of $38.12 billion, according to LSEG. Much of the discussion is likely to center on what management sees in the professional and do-it-yourself markets, and how customer activity is being impacted by the current interest rate environment and rate expectations for the rest of the year. For example, with Freddie Mac data showing that mortgage rates recently dropped to their lowest level since September 2022 , executives may be asked whether they've observed an uptick in DIY behavior in the current quarter. On the pro front, we're interested in seeing how past acquisitions in the building-products distribution industry are being integrated and whether they've led to additional cross-selling opportunities. As a reminder, home buying and new home construction are heavily tied to longer-term interest rates, whereas renovation projects depend more on medium-term home equity line of credit (HELOC) rates. Both of these dynamics, in turn, tie into demand for higher-priced appliances, which are often included with a new home purchase or a major renovation project. As Jim Cramer wrote Friday, the potential dovish leadership change at the Federal Reserve offers a glimmer of hope on the rates front. On Wednesday morning, we'll hear from TJX Companies for its all-important holiday quarter. Shares ended the week a mere two cents below its all-time closing high of $158.25, set on Jan. 8. As of Friday, the LSEG consensus calls for earnings of $1.39 per share on revenue of $17.36 billion. With the parent of TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and HomeGoods, it's all about the consumer. We expect TJX to remain a key beneficiary of high inflation, as consumers seek the best value. But going deeper, we'll be listening for any change in shopping habits across the different income cohorts. As of Friday, the Wall Street consensus is for TJX to deliver same-store sales growth of 3.83%. The drivers of that growth matter: Is it being fueled primarily by higher selling prices or an increase in transactions? The latter is what we want to see because it's a sign that the "treasure hunt" experience TJX's stores are known for is resonating. The performance across its various store brands is also of interest, particularly HomeGoods, which has delivered solid results despite the sluggish U.S. housing market. TJX directly imports a very small percentage of the merchandise it sells, so its exposure to tariffs is mostly indirect â meaning its vendors may sell products to TJX at a higher price to account for the tariffs it has paid. But executives may still be asked how additional tariff uncertainty could affect the overall merchandising environment. When there's excessive inventory sloshing around, it plays right into TJX's hands. 4. Qnity on Thursday will deliver its first real earnings report as a standalone company. Former parent DuPont hasn't preempted the numbers with its own release, like it did in November. This is the real thing. Up 39% year to date, Qnity's stock performance sets a high bar for the print, which is why we took profits on Friday. But the stock's big move is for good reason: Demand for AI semiconductors is booming, and the more chips that get fabricated and packaged, the better it is for Qnity and peers Element Solutions and Entegris . The latter two companies have already reported earnings for this season, delivering strong results and issuing positive forecasts. For Qnity, memory chips are set to be a big topic on the earnings call, as with Nvidia, due to HBM (high-bandwidth memory) pricing. Qnity is a close partner with Korea's SK Hynix , one of the leading HBM producers. At the same time, analysts may ask Qnity executives whether AI-driven memory price spikes could lead to demand destruction in other end markets outside the data center; for example, consumer electronics were 40% of its sales in 2024, compared with 15% for the AI and data center market, which is driving the bulk of its growth. Additionally, updates on how Qnity is positioned to capitalize on node transitions â industry parlance for moving to a more advanced manufacturing process, which typically requires more products from the likes of Qnity and peers â are welcome. As of Friday, according to LSEG, the Street is looking for earnings of 58 cents per share on revenue of $1.16 billion. 5. The main economic data report of the week is Friday's producer price index (PPI) for January, the cousin of the better-known consumer price index (CPI). The CPI measures what consumers pay for a bunch of goods and services. The PPI measures what producers are paid for their outputs â such as iron ore, grains, and services like trucking â making it a leading indicator of consumer inflation. If businesses see their input costs rise, they will either raise prices or take a hit to their margins, neither of which is ideal for investors. CPI for January came in cooler than expected , and investors who are hoping for multiple rate cuts this year are hoping PPI delivers more of the same. Economists expect the January PPI will be up 0.3% month over month, according to FactSet. On a core basis, which excludes food and energy, the consensus is for a 0.25% monthly increase and a 2% year-over-year rise. Week ahead Monday, February 23 Before the bell: Axsome Therapeutics (AXSM), Domino's Pizza (DPZ), GeneDx (WGS), Dominion Energy (D) After the bell: Hims & Hers Health (HIMS), BWX Technologies (BWXT), Kratos Defense & Security Solutions (KTOS), Primoris Services (PRIM), Keysight Technologies (KEYS), EverQuote (EVER), Diamondback Energy (FANG), Summit Therapeutics (SMMT), Ultra Clean Holdings (UCTT), UFP Industries (UFPI) Tuesday, February 24 FHFA Home Price Index at 9 a.m. ET The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Survey at 10 a.m. ET Census Bureau's Monthly Wholesale Trade Report (Final) at 10 a.m. ET Before the bell: Home Depot (HD), Cipher Mining (CIFR), DigitalOcean (DOCN), Leonardo DRS (DRS), NRG Energy (NRG), Amer Sports (AS), Fidelity National Information Services (FIS), Xometry (XMTR), Brightstar Lottery (BRSL), Expeditors International of Washington (EXPD) After the bell: AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC), MercadoLibre (MELI), Axon Enterprise (AXON), CAVA Group (CAVA), Navitas Semiconductor (NVTS), Workday (WDAY), Zeta Global (ZETA), Tempus AI (TEM), Unisys (UIS), HP (HPQ), First Solar (FSLR), CoStar Group (CSGP), Mosaic (MOS), Alphatec Holdings (ATEC), Lucid Group (LCID), Realty Income (O) Wednesday, February 25 Before the bell: TJX Companies (TJX) ,Â Hut 8 Mining (HUT), Photronics (PLAB), Trinity Capital (TRIN), Circle Internet Group (CRCL), Ionis Pharmaceuticals (IONS), Valens Semiconductor (VLN), Bank of Montreal (BMO), DigitalBridge Group (DBRG), Hayward Holdings (HAYW), Lowe's Companies (LOW) After the bell: NVIDIA (NVDA), Salesforce (CRM), Trade Desk (TTD), Snowflake (SNOW), IonQ (IONQ), ARRAY Technologies (ARRY), Synopsys (SNPS), Pure Storage (PSTG), Nutanix (NTNX), Nu Holdings (NU), SkyWater Technology (SKYT), VICI Properties (VICI), Zoom Communications (ZM) Thursday, February 26 Initial jobless claims at 8:30 a.m. ET Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Index at 11 a.m. ET Before the bell: Qnity Electronics (Q) , D-Wave Quantum (QBTS), Celsius Holdings (CELH), Vistra Energy (VST), ACM Research (ACMR), Eos Energy Enterprises (EOSE), Baidu (BIDU), BlackSky Technology (BKSY), Donaldson Company (DCI), GigaCloud Technology (GCT), Hormel Foods (HRL) After the bell: CoreWeave (CRWV), Rocket Lab USA (RKLB), Innodata (INOD), Dell Technologies (DELL), Opko Health (OPK), SoundHound AI (SOUN), Zscaler (ZS), Compass Diversified (CODI), Duolingo (DUOL), TeraWulf (WULF), Intuit (INTU), MP Materials (MP), NetApp (NTAP), NuScale Power (SMR), Block (XYZ) Friday, February 27 Producer Price Index (PPI) for January at 8:30 a.m. ET Advance Report on Durable Goods at 8:30 a.m. ET Before the bell: BrightSpring (BTSG), Delek US (DK) (See here for a full list of the stocks in Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio. If Jim has discussed a stock on CNBC, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.

Get the most out of Gold Price Tracker & Alerts

Join thousands of users. Track progress, stay informed, and succeed with Gold Price Tracker & Alerts.

Download Now

Available on iOS & Android

Get Gold Price Tracker & Alerts

Free on iOS & Android

Install

Here are the 5 big things we're watching in the stock market this week

Read Next

OpenAI brings its models to Amazon's cloud after ending exclusivity with Microsoft

Women tend to be 'risk-appropriate' investors, expert says: How that helps them in volatile markets

Get the most out of Gold Price Tracker & Alerts