Another wave of earnings today, hopefully a positive GDP reading for the first time in two-quarters and a vital decision from ECB on interest rates.

Majority of the Asian markets were seen trading higher early hours of Thursday, all due to the expectations that the Fed will be swayed from the hawkish stance during an economic slowdown. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index rallied almost 2% as it recovered from a 13-year low. The Taiwan index gained 1.4% and India’s 50 index risen by 0.5%. The power producing giant Datang International Power Generation, was adding the biggest weight on the indexes as its shares plummeted over 10%. The firm confirmed a loss of 635.6 million yuan for 9 months to September 30^th. A key issue for this has been increased power production costs due to coal shortages and latest drought.

Investors want to believe that the Federal Reserve will take the hints from the slowdown when the members meet next week. The Fed is expected by many to increased rates again by another 75 basis points, but it could ease off that pace in forthcoming meetings, potentially as early as December.

Today will present the first reading of the U.S. gross domestic product for Q3. Analysts are predicting the number to be positive for the first time in two quarters. It should provide investors with more guidance on the route of U.S. monetary policy.

Additionally, Jobless claims data comes out today and back in Europe, FTSE 100 set to open lower as U.S. markets lost their gains to poor earnings results. Plus, focus will also be on the ECB’s interest rate decision as analysts estimate a 75 basis points increase.

Key developments:

• GDP print for the third quarter is due at 13:30 GMT. Experts estimate a positive reading of 2.4% compared to the negative of 0.6% reported in the last reading of the Q2.
• Jobless claims data is also due at 13:30 GMT. Analysts forecast 220,000.
• ECB interest rate decision is due at 13:30 GMT.  

Earnings:

• Apple is expected to report an EPS of $1.26 with revenue of $88.76 billion.
• Amazon is set to report earnings of $0.2184 a share on revenue of $127.76 billion.
• Shell is expected to report an EPS of $2.64 with revenue of $84.76 billion.
• McDonald’s is set to report earnings of $2.59 a share on revenue of $5.72 billion.

(Sources: investing.com, reuters.com, proactiveinvestors.co.uk)