About 300 of the S&P 500 companies have now reported results on the quarter. Microsoft MSFT.O was among eye-catching reports this week. Its shares posted their biggest single-day percentage jump since 2008 on Thursday after the company gave an upbeat forecast on cloud growth.
Late Thursday, Amazon reported solid cloud sales growth that reinforced investor confidence in its massive AI bets. Among reports due next week are ones from Caterpillar CAT.N and Advanced Micro Devices AMD.N.
The forecast for second-quarter U.S. earnings has risen again this week after several key reports, LSEG data as of Friday showed.
Including companies that have reported along with estimates for the rest, S&P 500 earnings are on pace to rise 29.3% on an adjusted basis from a year ago.
The estimate is up from 27% a week ago and excludes "mark-to-market gains" from both Alphabet GOOGL.O, which reported results on July 22, and Amazon AMZN.O, which reported after the bell on Thursday, according to Tajinder Dhillon, head of earnings research at LSEG.
Including those gains, the latest growth estimate for the S&P 500 would be 47.7%, he said.
The adjusted second-quarter earnings forecast is now just slightly below the S&P 500's first-quarter earnings growth of 29.4%, based on LSEG data.
