Q4 Earnings, Davos Tension Inform Late Start to Trading Week

Tuesday, January 20th, 2026

Pre-market futures are tumbling to start a new holiday-shortened trading week, generally on global economic concerns. Pick a direction, you’ll find something: Japanese bonds are falling on Prime Minister Takaichi’s move to cut taxes on food, signaling a less-than-robust domestic economy; the wealthy and powerful men and women of Davos this week brace for President Trump’s appearance tomorrow at the 2026 World Economic Forum.

Trump’s latest fixation has been on the U.S. annexation of Greenland, which is currently an autonomous country under Denmark’s government. This shake-up in normal diplomacy threatens the very existence of NATO, and if military strikes from the U.S. indeed transpire, it would likely snap the post-WWII alliance. Currently, Trump is raising tariffs +10% on European countries who disapprove of this potential annexation. Retaliatory tariffs are already in place. Tomorrow’s appearance from the U.S. president will be key to where this latest drama unfolds.

Thus, the Dow is -700 points at this hour, the S&P 500 -106 and Nasdaq -460 points. The small-cap Russell 2000 is -50 points at this hour. Bond yields have risen to +4.3% on the 10-year and +3.6% on the 2-year. Both the stock and bond markets have room to maneuver, coming off healthy levels overall, but these developments do threaten to bring a material shift in economic conditions in ways other global disruptions have not, at least not so far in 2026.
 

Q4 Earnings Reports Ahead of the Bell: MMM, DHI, FITB

Global conglomerate 3M MMM posted mixed results in its Q4 report released early this morning. Earnings of $1.83 per share outpaced the Zacks consensus by a penny, while revenues of $6.0 billion in the quarter came in slightly below estimates of $6.08 billion. Officially, this marks the 12th-straight earnings beat, and both earnings and sales numbers are up notably year over year. But this is a tough morning in the market in general, and shares are down -3.75% at this moment.

D.R. Horton DHI — which calls itself “America’s Builder,” as it provides new homes across various economic levels of the housing market — posted good outperformance on both top and bottom lines. Earnings of $2.03 per share bettered the $1.95 expected, while $6.89 billion in revenues easily surpassed the $6.71 billion. This may be seen as a good sign for the U.S. housing market; the company has now beaten earnings estimates in two of the last four quarters. But shares are down -5.5% on the news.

Fifth Third Bank FITB also outperformed expectations on both earnings and sales, with $1.12 per share reported on $2.34 billion in revenues. These outperformed expectations for $1.00 per share and $2.32 billion, respectively. This makes 12-straight earnings beats for the Cincinnati-based bank. Shares are down -1.5% on a rough trading morning, but still up +9% over the past year.
 

What to Expect from the Market Today

Earnings and more earnings! Zacks Rank #3 (Hold)-rated Netflix NFLX reports Q4 results after today’s close, looking for +27.9% earnings growth year over year and +16.8% on revenues. United Airlines UAL, also a Zacks Rank #3, is expected to bring -8.6% earnings growth and +4.67% higher revenues from a year ago. Regional bank reportage continues, as well, with Bank OZK OZK, Zions Bancorp ZION and Wintrust Financial WTFC coming out with earnings results this afternoon.

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