What happened last week…
President Donald Trump said the 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada, which were delayed from implementation for one month, will go into effect on March 4. China will have an additional 10% tariff placed on top of the existing 10% tariff on the country.
Eli Lilly (LLY) will invest $27 billion for four new manufacturing facilities in the U.S. thanks to strong demand for its weight loss and diabetes drugs. The investment will create more than 3,000 jobs upon completion and 10,000 construction jobs when the facilities are built. The company also reduced the cost of its weight loss drug Zepbound and released higher dose options.
Apple (AAPL) will build a 250,000-square-foot factory in Texas for artificial intelligence servers as part of a $500 billion spending plan over the next four years. The factory is expected to be operational in 2026. Apple also announced it would hire 20,000 new employees across the U.S. over that timeframe.
The GDP growth rate (second estimate) for Q4 2024 matched expectations as it remained at 2.3%, compared to the first estimate. The reading is a decrease from the Q3 2024 rate of 3.1%. The Q2 2024 rate was 3.0% and the Q1 2024 rate was 1.6%, which was the lowest growth since the Covid pandemic.
New home sales for January missed expectations (680,000) as it decreased to 657,000 from the upwardly revised 734,000 (from 698,000). It is the lowest reading since October 2024.
Happening this week…
On Monday, the manufacturing PMI for February is expected to decrease to 50.8 from 50.9, which was the first expansionary reading after 26 consecutive months in contraction (below 50). On Wednesday, the non-manufacturing PMI for February is expected to increase to 53.0 from 52.8, which marked seven straight months of expansion. The figure has expanded in 53 of the previous 56 months.
On Wednesday, the ADP employment change may decrease to 140,000 from 183,000. On Friday, the unemployment rate is expected to remain at 4.0%, nonfarm payrolls are forecasted to decrease to 133,000 from 143,000, and average hourly earnings month-over-month are expected to decrease to 0.3% from 0.5%.
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- The Rockline Team
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