Cramer’s week ahead: Retail earnings to reveal how consumers feel about economy, higher prices

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Friday looked ahead to next week’s most important earnings report, after Wall Street ended on a strong note Friday but snapped a five-week winning streak.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose nearly 180 points, or 0.5% on Friday. The S&P 500 gained about 0.7% and the Nasdaq added 1%. However, those gains were not enough to overcome the selling after Wednesday’s hottest consumer inflation report in more than 30 years. For the week, the Dow fell 0.6%; the S&P 500 dipped 0.3% and the Nasdaq dropped about 0.7%.

“You’ve got all these stentorian hedge fund billionaires who’re eager to shoot at the great growth stocks of this era, especially the Nasdaq names. They come on air and blast these stocks, then look like morons when the high-fliers come roaring back a few days later,” Cramer said about this week’s market. “It was the short-sellers covering” that sent the market up late in the week, he added.

Next week, Cramer said, “Look for a week where the shorts are still trapped, the consumer is robust, and tech falters, if only because it has run so much. But therein lies the opportunity, is to wait to the falter. I lot of these stocks have run too much.” He also said to watch oil to see if it’s topped.

There’s a long list of retail earnings that will provide a glimpse into how American consumers feel about spending their money and whether they’re becoming more frugal as prices soar. Investors also hope to get a sense of what these companies, including Walmart and Target, expect heading into the holiday shopping season.

Here’s what the “Mad Money” host will be watching. All revenue and earnings per share estimates are from FactSet. All times are ET.

Monday: Tyson Foods and Lucid

Tyson Foods

• Q4 2021 earnings before the bell, conference call at 9 a.m.
• EPS estimate $2.22
• Revenue $12.66 billion

“If you’re searching for inflation,” Cramer said, “you’ll find it at Tyson Foods.” He added, “We know food inflation’s hitting everyone hard. Tyson will hurt the bull case for certain.”

Lucid Group

• Q3 2021 results after the bell, conference call at 5 p.m.
• Per-share estimated loss ($0.25)
• Revenue $1.3 million

“The luxury electric vehicle maker … might be due for a revaluation after Rivian‘s monster move this week,” Cramer said. “We’ll be in San Francisco next week, where we hope to catch a glimpse of Lucid’s car. I think this is one of a handful of companies that’s ushering in the twilight of the internal combustion engine. … You know I like Tesla and Rivian, but given the state of this market, I’m betting any of them can work here.”

Walmart

• Q3 2022 before the bell, conference call at 8 a.m.
• EPS estimate $1.40
• Revenue $135.43 billion

“I’m getting signals from my chartist friends that Walmart’s stock’s in a corner, could have an ugly double top brewing,” Cramer said. “As someone who owns it for my charitable trust, I have to take every clue into account, even as I think Walmart’s doing fine.”

Home Depot

• Q3 2021 earnings before the bell, conference call at 9 a.m.
• EPS estimate $3.41
• Revenue $34.89 billion

“This one’s got a pattern … it tends to open up on earnings news and then plunge later in the day when they listen to the conference call,” Cramer said. “If you don’t already own it, I recommend waiting for the typical post-quarter sell-off.”

Target

• Q3 2021 earnings before the bell, conference call at 8 a.m.
• EPS estimate $2.82
• Revenue $24.55 billion

Cisco Systems

• Q1 2022 earnings after the bell, conference call at 4:30 p.m.
• EPS estimate $0.80
• Revenue $12.98 billion

“Cisco’s now the definition of a cheap tech stock. We’ll be following it closely to see how it’s transition to more of a subscription based service provider is going. Higher margins. I expect good things,” Cramer said.

Nvidia

• Q3 2022 earnings after the bell, conference call at 5 p.m.
• EPS estimate $1.11
• Revenue $6.82 billion

“Nvidia’s got a tough act to follow: itself. The stock’s already more than doubled year-to-date, so the expectations are high,” Cramer said. “This one’s so deep into next week that you’ll have to check your investment bulletins to see what we’re thinking. We do a deep dive into all of the charitable trusts stocks when they report.”

Macy’s

• Q3 2021 before the bell, conference call at 8 a.m.
• EPS estimate $0.30
• Revenue $5.19 billion

Kohl’s

• Q3 2021 earnings before the bell, conference call at 9 a.m.
• EPS estimate $0.70
• Revenue $4.26 billion

“As I keep telling you, I love retail right now because the consumer’s so strong that it can trump any worries about a lack of inventory,” Cramer said. “What matters is there are very few promotions going on. They can sell almost everything at full-price that they have, and that sends their stocks higher.”

Applied Materials

• Q4 2021 earnings after the bell, conference call at 4:30 p.m.
• EPS estimate $1.96
• Revenue $6.38 billion

“Applied Materials tends to trade with Micron, the big commodity chipmaker, and Micron’s been red-hot all week, although no one’s talking about it except for me,” Cramer said.

Intuit

• Q1 2022 earnings after the bell, conference call at 4:30 p.m.
• EPS estimate 97 cents
• Revenue $1.81 billion

“We also hear from Intuit, the small business owner’s best friend. This software company’s been consistently fabulous. It will be fabulous again,” Cramer said.

Workday

• Q3 2022 earnings after the bell, conference call 4:30 p.m.
• EPS estimate $0.87
• Revenue $1.31 billion

“There’s Workday, the cloud based human capital and actual capital management software play. I think Workday’s last acquisition is just crushing it. That last quarter was amazing for them,” Cramer said.

Palo Alto Networks

• Q1 2022 earnings after the bell, conference call at 4:30 p.m.
• EPS estimate $1.57
• Revenue $1.2 billion

“With so many people still working from home, I think this is a golden age for cyber-security companies,” Cramer said. “The last few quarters have been extraordinary [at Palo Alto]. You know what, you’re going to get another one.”

Foot Locker

• Q3 2021 earnings before the bell, conference call at 9 a.m.
• EPS estimate $1.35
• Revenue $2.12 billion

“When you go back to Nike‘s most recent quarter, there were a couple of things we didn’t like, especially the manufacturing problems and the slowdown in China. But the U.S.? Nike’s on fire here,” Cramer said. “This is a fantastic set-up for a mall based shoe store and there you are with Foot Locker. If they can’t blow it out in this environment, I don’t know when they can.”

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