Powell's Back, Palantir's IPO, Cereal Profits: 3 Things for the Day Ahead

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Investing.com  — Markets closed higher after struggling to figure out what to do with the day, recovering from three down days. 

Shares recovered a bit from Monday’s pummeling, with tech in the lead, as usual. Banks were lower after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated to Congress that the central bank remains committed to using its tools “for as long as it takes, to ensure that the recovery will be as strong as possible, and to limit lasting damage to the economy.”

The U.K. is shutting back down for six months because of a Covid-19 resurgence, and the U.S. has more than 200,000 people dead because of the virus. 

There’s more Powell testimony on Capitol Hill coming up Wednesday, along with a big-name IPO and a couple of earnings reports.

Here are three things that may move markets tomorrow:

1. Day two of Fed Chair’s testimony on Capitol Hill

Powell appears before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus at 10:00 AM ET (1400 GMT) to discuss the central bank’s response.

On Tuesday, Powell said the U.S. economy has a long way to go before fully recovering from the coronavirus pandemic and will need further support, Bloomberg reported.

“The path forward will depend on keeping the virus under control, and on policy actions taken at all levels of government,” he said told the House Financial Services Committee. While a recovery is underway, “both employment and overall economic activity, however, remain well below their pre-pandemic levels, and the path ahead continues to be highly uncertain.”

2. Yet another highly-anticipated IPO 

Peter Thiel’s Palantir Technologies is finally planning its debut via a direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange. The highly anticipated listing was slated for Wednesday, but Renaissance Capital recently reported it could be pushed back to Sept. 29. Either way, investors will be watching the latest tech go public with keen interest.

The company detects patterns in large data sets, and works with U.S. government spy agencies, among others. Thiel is a PayPal Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:PYPL)co-founder and early investor in Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT). 

3. Company earnings

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) reports fiscal 2021 first quarter results tomorrow. Analysts expect the cereal maker to post earnings per share of 87 cents on sales of $4.22 billion. Shares are up about 9% in 2020.

Cintas (NASDAQ:CTAS) should publish earnings per share of $2.11 on sales of $1.69 billion when it reports tomorrow. The stock is up about 10% this year.