From Reuters.com
The day ahead: Thursday
Wal-Mart sales numbers will hold the spotlight along with results from Walt Disney and Anheuser-Busch InBev. Highlights:
* Wal-Mart is expected to report higher third-quarter earnings, but Wall Street is focused on U.S. sales, which the retailer has stopped reporting on a monthly basis.
* Walt Disney is expected to report earnings of 41 cents per share and further emphasize a recovery in advertising sales seen at the cable networks of competitors Time Warner and Viacom.
* Anheuser-Busch InBev is braced to report a decline in consumption of its beers such as Budweiser, Stella Artois and Beck’s, weighing on profits in the first half.
* At the fourth day of the Reuters Health Summit being held in New York, we speak with FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, GlaxoSmithKline CEO Andrew Witty, and Schering-Plough CEO Fred Hassan.
* Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner arrives in Singapore for a meeting of finance ministers from the 21-nation Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.
The day ahead: Friday
The stock market may get a boost from consumer sentiment data, which is expected to be higher from the “cash-for-clunkers” program.
* The Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary reading of consumer sentiment for September is due at 9:55 a.m. EDT.
* Campbell Soup reports earnings for the fourth quarter. Watch for signs about how the soup business is doing against lower-priced competitors.
* An auction is scheduled in Delaware bankruptcy court for Nortel Network’s enterprise business.
* Revised figures are expected to confirm that while Japan’s economy emerged from its worst recession since World War Two this past spring, recovery will be slow and far from assured as much of it depends on stimulus measures that will eventually expire.
* Die-hard fans of Walt Disney are in California for the company’s first-ever fan exposition and what Disney hopes will be a show of the durability of its brands in a tough time.
