Wall Street Week Ahead

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•  16 Nov 2025
 

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The week Wall Street has been waiting for has finally arrived. After 43 days of flying blind through the longest government shutdown in American history, traders and investors are about to get clarity on two critical questions: where the economy actually stands, and whether artificial intelligence can still justify sky-high valuations. The data drought is ending just as $NVDA prepares to report earnings Wednesday after the close, and with a packed calendar of retail earnings that will reveal whether the American consumer is still spending or finally tapping the brakes.

The September jobs report, originally scheduled for early October, will publish Thursday, giving us the first official read on employment trends in months. This matters more than usual because the Federal Reserve has been making policy decisions without one of its most important inputs. When October numbers eventually arrive, they're expected to show significant job losses, potentially around 1.5 million, largely because federal workers were off payrolls during the shutdown. That creates noise in the data, but it also means the Fed will be parsing every detail to separate shutdown effects from genuine labor market weakness.

The real tension this week isn't just about one earnings report or one data release. It's about whether the market twin pillars of support, technology and consumer spending, can hold up under scrutiny. Over 90 percent of S&P 500 companies have already reported third-quarter results, with earnings growth running around 13 percent year over year. That's the fourth straight quarter of double-digit growth, a remarkable run that's kept the market buoyant even as volatility has crept back in. But those backward-looking numbers only tell you where we've been, not where we're headed.

Wednesday evening, all eyes will be on $NVDA. Analyst consensus expects revenue of roughly $54.9 billion for the fiscal quarter that ended in October, representing about 57 percent growth compared to the same period last year. Earnings per share are projected at $1.25, up from $0.81 a year ago. Those are massive numbers, but they're also what everyone already knows. What matters is the guidance and the tone. Will demand for Hopper chips stay strong? How quickly is Blackwell ramping? What's happening with China sales given the export restrictions? And critically, are hyperscalers like $MSFT $GOOGL and $AMZN still ordering at the same pace, or are they starting to digest what they've already bought?

$NVDA shares have already pulled back about five percent over the past week, setting up what could be either a relief rally if the company beats and guides well, or a sharper correction if anything disappoints. The nervousness is palpable. This isn't just about one company anymore; Nvidia has become a proxy for the entire AI infrastructure build-out, and any sign of slowing momentum will ripple across the semiconductor, cloud, and software sectors. The market has been rotating lately, with money flowing out of mega-cap tech and into more traditional sectors, and Nvidia report will either validate that shift or reverse it.

But Nvidia isn't the only test this week. Thursday, $WMT reports earnings, and that matters just as much for a different reason. Walmart is the country largest retailer, and its results will give us a direct line of sight into how the American consumer is actually behaving heading into the holiday season. Analysts expect earnings of around $0.61 per share, representing modest year-over-year growth. The question isn't whether Walmart will beat, it usually does, but what the company says about traffic, ticket sizes, and inventory levels. Are middle-income shoppers trading down? Are higher earners still splurging? Is Black Friday shaping up strong or soft?

Joining Walmart on the earnings calendar this week are $TGT, $HD, $LOW, $GAP and several others from the retail and consumer sectors. Together, these reports will paint a picture of consumer health right before the most important shopping period of the year. There have been growing signs of pressure on middle and lower-income households, with credit card delinquencies ticking up and savings rates declining. If these retailers start signaling caution, it will feed concerns that the consumer-driven economy is finally losing steam.

Then there's the macro calendar. Beyond Thursday September jobs report, we'll get housing starts, building permits, the Philly Fed index, and existing home sales. Friday brings S&P Global PMI readings for manufacturing and services, plus the University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey. That sentiment number has been sliding, hitting levels not seen since the pandemic-era inflation surge, and any further deterioration will weigh on expectations for holiday spending and first-quarter growth.

The economic backdrop is more uncertain than it's been in months. The shutdown lasted 43 days, wiped out an estimated 0.8 percent of annualized GDP growth, and caused roughly 60,000 private-sector job losses. Much of that will be recovered as furloughed workers get back pay and spending normalizes, but the disruption has already happened. Meanwhile, the Fed is trying to calibrate policy without reliable data, and officials have been unusually cautious about their next moves. If the September jobs report shows unexpected weakness, it could accelerate the timeline for rate cuts. If it holds up better than feared, the Fed might pause longer than markets currently expect.

What makes this week especially tricky is that investors are dealing with multiple layers of uncertainty at once. There's uncertainty about the data itself, since shutdown effects will distort the numbers. There's uncertainty about earnings, with Nvidia and the retailers both carrying high expectations that could easily be missed. And there's broader uncertainty about policy, with tariffs, immigration enforcement, and fiscal debates all creating crosscurrents that are hard to model.

The market has been remarkably resilient this year, with the S&P 500 up solidly despite all the noise. But that resilience has come with a price: valuations are stretched, concentration risk is high, and sentiment has become more fragile. A few weeks ago, any dip was bought aggressively. Now, there's hesitation. Traders are waiting for confirmation that the growth story is intact before committing fresh capital, and this week will either provide that confirmation or raise new doubts.

For anyone positioned in $NVDA or the retail names, Wednesday and Thursday are the days that matter. For those watching the broader economy, Thursday jobs data is the inflection point. And for everyone trying to read the Fed next move, the combination of employment, sentiment, and inflation-adjacent data this week will set the tone for December policy meeting.

The question is what we'll see when it clears. This isn't a week to make bold calls or ignore risk. It's a week to listen carefully, read between the lines and understand that markets can move fast when expectations collide with reality. Whether you're long, short or sitting on cash, this is the week that sets up the final stretch of the year.

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