This week, two big stories are colliding in the U.S. stock market. A dense “second wave” of AI-infrastructure earnings — led by Broadcom, Dell, and a handful of enterprise software names — will test whether the AI spending boom Nvidia and Marvell confirmed last week has real breadth. At the same time, Friday’s August jobs report could decide whether the Federal Reserve actually raises interest rates on September 16, after Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole speech pushed rate-hike odds to 57%.
With the S&P 500 still within striking distance of its record high, this is a week that could set the market’s tone heading into mid-September. Below is a plain-English breakdown of the 10 U.S. stocks to watch, the economic and earnings calendars behind them, and the risks worth keeping an eye on — with a clear line drawn between what’s confirmed and what’s simply expected.
Quick Answer: What to Know Before Monday’s Open
Broadcom reports earnings after the close on Wednesday, September 2, with management guiding to roughly $29.4 billion in revenue and Wall Street penciling in about $3.24 in earnings per share. Dell Technologies, MongoDB, and Palo Alto Networks all report the day before, on Tuesday, September 1. The single biggest event of the week, though, is Friday, September 4, when the August jobs report lands at 8:30 a.m. ET — a release that could confirm or unwind the market’s post-Jackson Hole bet on a September rate hike. Layered on top: Snowflake, Ciena, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and Zscaler round out one of the busiest software and AI-infrastructure earnings weeks of the quarter, while Lululemon and Brown-Forman offer two very different reads on U.S. consumer health.
Why This Week Matters
The S&P 500 closed the prior week at 7,711, down slightly on Friday but still within roughly 1.3% of its mid-August record close of 7,814.88. That Friday pullback followed Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s first Jackson Hole keynote, in which he called the Fed’s 2% inflation target “a firm, fixed target” and pointed to a 12-month PCE inflation reading of 3.7% — comments markets read as hawkish. Treasury yields jumped in response: the 10-year rose to 4.728% and the 2-year to 4.35%, while the U.S. Dollar Index climbed 0.5% to 99.65.
The market reaction was immediate. CME FedWatch odds of a 25-basis-point rate hike at the Fed’s September 16 meeting jumped to 57%, up from just 39.9% a week earlier. But here’s the twist: July’s jobs data argues the opposite case. Nonfarm payrolls rose just 57,000 that month, with prior months revised down, and private payrolls (ADP) grew only 44,000 — both signs of a cooling labor market rather than an overheating one. With no CPI report due until September 11, this week’s data — ISM Manufacturing and job openings Tuesday, ADP and the Fed’s Beige Book Wednesday, ISM Services Thursday, and the August jobs report Friday — will carry outsized weight in resolving that tension.
On the earnings side, this is genuinely one of the busiest weeks of the quarter for AI-infrastructure and enterprise software. Dell, MongoDB, and Palo Alto Networks report Tuesday; Broadcom, Snowflake, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise report Wednesday; and Ciena, Zscaler, and Lululemon report Thursday. Options markets are pricing unusually large swings across nearly all of them, a sign that positioning heading into the week is genuinely two-sided rather than one-directional.
Retail earnings add a third layer. Lululemon’s own guidance points to a 150-basis-point tariff hit to gross margin, while Brown-Forman carries the single largest options-implied move of the week at 15.98% — bigger than any technology name — making it a surprisingly important stock for anyone tracking U.S. consumer spending.
This Week’s U.S. Economic Calendar
Two days matter most: Wednesday, when ADP payrolls data and the Fed’s Beige Book arrive, and Friday, when the August jobs report lands and does more than anything else to settle the rate-hike debate.
| Date | Time (ET) | Event | Importance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon, Aug 31 | — | No major U.S. releases scheduled | Low |
| Tue, Sep 1 | 10:00 AM | ISM Manufacturing PMI (Aug) / JOLTS Job Openings (Jul) | High |
| Wed, Sep 2 | 8:15 AM | ADP Employment Change (Aug) | High |
| Wed, Sep 2 | 2:00 PM | Federal Reserve Beige Book | High |
| Thu, Sep 3 | 8:30 AM | Weekly Jobless Claims | Medium-High |
| Thu, Sep 3 | 10:00 AM | ISM Services PMI (Aug) | High |
| Fri, Sep 4 | 8:30 AM | Nonfarm Payrolls, Unemployment Rate (Aug) | Critical |
July’s ISM Manufacturing reading of 55.6 and ISM Services reading of 54.1 both signaled expansion, but July payrolls of just 57,000 and ADP of 44,000 both pointed to cooling hiring — a genuine contradiction this week’s data needs to help sort out.
This Week’s Earnings Calendar
Tuesday and Wednesday are the two heaviest earnings days, with Dell, MongoDB, and Palo Alto Networks reporting Tuesday, and Broadcom, Snowflake, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise reporting Wednesday.
| Company | Ticker | Date | Estimate / Key Figure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dell Technologies | DELL | Tue, Sep 1 | EPS est. ~$4.91 |
| MongoDB | MDB | Tue, Sep 1 | EPS est. ~$1.62; FY27 revenue guide $2.86–$2.90B |
| Palo Alto Networks | PANW | Tue, Sep 1 | Q4 EPS est. ~$0.51; FY26 guide $3.77–$3.79 EPS |
| Broadcom | AVGO | Wed, Sep 2 | Revenue guide ~$29.4B (+84% YoY); EPS est. ~$3.24 |
| Snowflake | SNOW | Wed, Sep 2 | 10.76% options-implied move |
| Hewlett Packard Enterprise | HPE | Wed, Sep 2 | 10.79% options-implied move |
| Brown-Forman | BF.B | Wed, Sep 2 | EPS est. ~$0.37; 15.98% options-implied move |
| Ciena | CIEN | Thu, Sep 3 | EPS est. ~$1.72; 11.65% options-implied move |
| Zscaler | ZS | Thu, Sep 3 | 12.75% options-implied move |
| Lululemon Athletica | LULU | Thu, Sep 3 | EPS est. ~$1.79 (-42.3% YoY) |
Several other names — NetApp, Five Below, C3.ai, Samsara, DocuSign, Guidewire, Campbell’s, RH, and PVH Corp among them — also report this week but aren’t covered in depth below.
Top 10 U.S. Stocks to Watch This Week
These 10 stocks were selected not because they’re the biggest companies, but because they have the clearest, most concrete catalysts — scheduled earnings dates, guided revenue ranges, or unusually large options-implied moves — most likely to move their share price this week.
1. Broadcom (AVGO) — Nasdaq
Sector: Semiconductors (AI networking, custom silicon) | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: Very High | Expected Volatility: Extreme
Primary catalyst: Fiscal Q3 earnings after the close Wednesday, September 2. Management guided to roughly $29.4 billion in revenue (+84% year-over-year), with consensus EPS near $3.24 (+92% year-over-year).
Supporting factors: Goldman Sachs projects the optical-networking market growing from $15 billion in 2026 to $154 billion by 2028, and Broadcom’s co-packaged optics position it to capture a large share. OpenAI’s newly disclosed “Jalapeño” custom AI processor, co-developed with Broadcom, points to a multi-generation custom-silicon pipeline.
Bullish case: A beat-and-raise confirming both the optical-networking ramp and custom AI-chip bookings would validate that the AI capex cycle has room to run, a week after Nvidia’s own strong print. Broadcom also trades at roughly 19 times forward earnings versus about 24 times for the Nasdaq-100, leaving room for a re-rating on good news.
Bearish case: Any sign that hyperscaler custom-silicon orders are decelerating, or that networking revenue is merely in line rather than accelerating, would be read as a warning sign for the broader AI-infrastructure trade.
Key risks: Customer concentration among a small number of hyperscalers; execution risk on the ramp; a hawkish Fed outcome later in September compounding any multiple compression across high-growth tech.
Important dates: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (after market close).
Why it made the list: Broadcom is this week’s most consequential single print for the AI-infrastructure trade — effectively the “second Nvidia moment” of the two-week earnings arc — and directly informs sentiment across Dell, Ciena, and HPE, which all trade in sympathy.
2. Lululemon Athletica (LULU) — Nasdaq
Sector: Apparel & Athleisure | Current Trend: Bearish | Conviction: Medium | Expected Volatility: Extreme
Primary catalyst: Q2 fiscal 2026 earnings Thursday, September 3 (after close). Consensus calls for EPS of $1.79, a 42.3% year-over-year decline, and revenue near $2.5 billion, in line with management’s own guide.
Supporting factors: Management expects a 150-basis-point tariff-driven hit to gross margin with only partial offsets, and operating margin is projected to contract roughly 910 basis points on markdowns, cost deleverage, and tariffs. North America traffic remains soft, particularly in the women’s category, while international markets — especially China — are expected to grow mid-to-high-teens.
Bullish case: Evidence that international growth is offsetting North American softness faster than modeled could spark a relief rally, given the stock is already down 11.4% over three months and trades at a discount to its industry.
Bearish case: Confirmation of deeper North American demand deterioration, or a further guidance cut, would extend the stock’s underperformance against both its industry peers and the broader market.
Key risks: Tariff policy remains fluid and could widen the margin headwind further; soft U.S. brand perception is a harder-to-model, qualitative risk.
Important dates: Earnings Thursday, September 3 (after close).
Why it made the list: Lululemon is the week’s single clearest, most data-rich example of tariff-driven margin compression hitting a household-name retailer — a story with broad reader relevance heading into the holiday season.
3. MongoDB (MDB) — Nasdaq
Sector: Database & AI Infrastructure Software | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: High | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Q2 fiscal 2027 earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close). The company has guided full-year revenue of $2.86 billion to $2.90 billion, representing 16% to 18% growth — a deceleration from 22.79% growth the prior year that the market will watch closely.
Supporting factors: Atlas, MongoDB’s cloud platform, grew 29% year-over-year and now represents roughly 79% of subscription revenue. The company beat estimates on both lines last quarter — its fourth beat in five quarters — and management is positioning vector search and embedding tools as core AI-agent infrastructure.
Bullish case: A fifth consecutive beat, alongside reassurance that Atlas growth and AI-workload adoption are offsetting the guided deceleration, could push shares — already up over 30% in the past month — back toward their 52-week high.
Bearish case: Confirmation of the guided growth deceleration, paired with an unfilled chief revenue officer seat, would validate concerns about slowing enterprise database spending.
Key risks: Valuation remains growth-dependent; options markets are pricing a 14.06% implied move, the largest of any technology name this week.
Important dates: Earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close).
Why it made the list: With more analysts rating it a Buy than any other rating, and the single largest options-implied move among this week’s software reporters, MongoDB is the highest-conviction “AI database” story of the week.
4. Dell Technologies (DELL) — NYSE
Sector: Hardware, AI Servers & Infrastructure | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: High | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Q2 fiscal 2027 earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close). Consensus EPS sits near $4.91, with the market focused on AI-optimized server order backlog and shipment cadence after several consecutive quarters of record AI-server revenue.
Supporting factors: Dell is one of the primary integrators translating hyperscaler and enterprise AI capex into shipped hardware, with recent quarters showing AI-server backlog and full-year outlooks rising in tandem. Traditional PC demand provides a secondary, more cyclical read.
Bullish case: Continued backlog growth and reaffirmed or raised full-year AI-server revenue guidance, delivered one day before Broadcom’s own AI-networking print, would reinforce the AI-buildout narrative from both the compute and networking sides at once.
Bearish case: Any signal of AI-server order softening or margin compression from component costs would raise fresh questions about the durability of hyperscaler capex just as the market digests Broadcom’s report the next day.
Key risks: Thin hardware margins relative to software peers; supply-chain and component-cost volatility; tariff exposure on imported components.
Important dates: Earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close), one day ahead of Broadcom.
Why it made the list: Dell is the clearest hardware-side read on AI-infrastructure demand this week, pairing directly with Broadcom’s networking story to give readers a fuller picture of the AI capex cycle from compute to interconnect.
5. Palo Alto Networks (PANW) — Nasdaq
Sector: Cybersecurity | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: High | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Fiscal Q4 and full-year 2026 earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close). Consensus Q4 EPS sits at $0.51 (+21.4% year-over-year), with full-year guidance of $3.77 to $3.79 EPS on $11.42 billion to $11.43 billion in revenue.
Supporting factors: The company’s “platformization” strategy — bundling Prisma Access, Strata Cloud Manager, and the newer Prisma AIRS AI-security suite — is the central growth narrative, with FY2027 consensus already calling for roughly 10.3% EPS growth.
Bullish case: Continued platformization traction and AI-security demand could support the stock’s already-strong 52-week gain and push it toward analysts’ average price target.
Bearish case: Any deceleration in platform-consolidation deal signings, or guidance seen as merely in line, would be a setback given how much of the recent rally already assumes continued acceleration.
Key risks: Valuation following a strong 52-week run; competitive intensity in AI-native security from newer entrants, including fellow Top-10 name Zscaler.
Important dates: Earnings Tuesday, September 1 (after close).
Why it made the list: With the large majority of covering analysts at Strong Buy, Palo Alto Networks is the week’s cybersecurity bellwether and a direct test of whether platformization can keep outgrowing the broader security-software market.
6. Snowflake (SNOW) — NYSE
Sector: Cloud Data Platform & AI | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: Medium-High | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (after close). The market’s focus is on AI-agent workloads increasingly running against Snowflake’s data platform, a theme management has actively promoted.
Supporting factors: Reports ahead of the print highlight AI agents “pouring more data” into Snowflake as enterprises operationalize generative AI — a narrative that, if confirmed in usage-based revenue metrics, would support the stock’s premium valuation relative to peers like MongoDB.
Bullish case: Accelerating consumption revenue tied to AI-agent workloads would validate Snowflake’s positioning as core AI infrastructure rather than legacy data-warehousing exposure.
Bearish case: Any sign that AI-workload monetization is not yet materially moving the revenue needle would raise valuation concerns given the stock’s premium multiple.
Key risks: A consumption-based revenue model makes near-term results more volatile and harder to forecast than subscription peers; competitive pressure from hyperscaler-native data platforms and MongoDB.
Important dates: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (after close), same day as Broadcom.
Why it made the list: Snowflake is the week’s clearest test of whether the “AI agents need data infrastructure” thesis is showing up in actual usage growth, with a 10.76% implied move reflecting real market uncertainty about the outcome.
7. Ciena (CIEN) — NYSE
Sector: Optical Networking | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: Medium | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Earnings Thursday, September 3 (before open). Consensus EPS sits near $1.72, with optical-networking capacity demand tied directly to the AI-data-center buildout theme also driving Broadcom’s report one day earlier.
Supporting factors: Ciena sits in the same AI-infrastructure-buildout complex as Broadcom’s optics business, giving its report incremental value on whether optical-networking demand is broad-based across suppliers rather than concentrated in Broadcom alone.
Bullish case: Strong bookings and backlog commentary echoing Broadcom’s own networking story would reinforce that AI-data-center interconnect demand is an industry-wide tailwind, not a single-company story.
Bearish case: Softer-than-expected orders would raise questions about whether Wednesday’s Broadcom strength was company-specific rather than reflective of the broader networking-equipment market.
Key risks: Customer concentration among large telecom and hyperscaler buyers; competitive and pricing pressure in optical components.
Important dates: Earnings Thursday, September 3 (before open), one day after Broadcom.
Why it made the list: Ciena offers a same-week cross-check on Broadcom’s AI-networking narrative from a different point in the supply chain, useful for readers gauging how broad the AI-infrastructure buildout really is.
8. Zscaler (ZS) — Nasdaq
Sector: Cloud & Zero-Trust Cybersecurity | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: Medium | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Earnings Thursday, September 3 (after close). The market will compare results directly against Palo Alto Networks’ Tuesday print to gauge relative growth and platform-consolidation momentum across the two leading cybersecurity vendors.
Supporting factors: Zero-trust and cloud-security demand continues to be one of the more resilient enterprise IT spending categories even amid broader software-budget scrutiny.
Bullish case: Growth reacceleration or upside guidance would support the broader cybersecurity-sector bull case already being tested by Palo Alto Networks two days earlier.
Bearish case: Deceleration relative to Palo Alto Networks’ results would suggest share losses to platformization-focused competitors.
Key risks: Direct competitive overlap with Palo Alto Networks’ expanding platform strategy; options markets are pricing a 12.75% implied move.
Important dates: Earnings Thursday, September 3 (after close).
Why it made the list: Paired with Palo Alto Networks earlier in the week, Zscaler gives readers a genuine head-to-head comparison within cybersecurity — one of the stickiest enterprise software categories.
9. Brown-Forman (BF.B) — NYSE
Sector: Beverages (Spirits) | Current Trend: Neutral | Conviction: Medium | Expected Volatility: Extreme
Primary catalyst: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (before open). Consensus EPS sits near $0.37, with the market focused on Jack Daniel’s volume trends and broader U.S. spirits demand.
Supporting factors: Options markets imply a 15.98% post-earnings move — the single largest of any company reporting this week, technology names included — reflecting genuine uncertainty about U.S. consumer discretionary spending on alcohol.
Bullish case: Stabilizing U.S. volumes and continued international growth could spark a sharp relief rally given how depressed expectations appear to be, reflected in the outsized implied move.
Bearish case: Continued volume softness in the core U.S. spirits market, consistent with a broader “cautious consumer” theme also visible in Lululemon’s results the following day, would extend recent underperformance.
Key risks: Discretionary spending sensitivity; tariff exposure on imported inputs and export markets.
Important dates: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (before open).
Why it made the list: With the single largest implied move of the week, Brown-Forman is a genuinely underappreciated volatility event — a consumer-staples name behaving like a high-beta growth stock.
10. Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) — NYSE
Sector: Enterprise Servers & Networking | Current Trend: Bullish | Conviction: Medium | Expected Volatility: High
Primary catalyst: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (after close) — reporting the same day as Broadcom, giving the market a same-day cross-check between AI-networking chips and AI server and networking systems.
Supporting factors: HPE’s AI-server and networking segments have benefited from the same hyperscaler and enterprise AI-capex cycle lifting Dell, making its results a useful third data point on the health of AI-infrastructure spending this week.
Bullish case: Confirmation of continued AI-server order growth alongside Dell’s report the day before would reinforce the “AI capex cycle intact” narrative heading into Broadcom’s after-hours print the same evening.
Bearish case: Margin pressure in the lower-margin server business, a recurring theme for hardware integrators, would raise questions about how much of the AI buildout is translating into hardware-vendor profitability.
Key risks: Thin hardware margins; competitive pricing pressure from Dell and other integrators; options markets are pricing a 10.79% implied move.
Important dates: Earnings Wednesday, September 2 (after close), same day as Broadcom.
Why it made the list: HPE completes the week’s three-part AI-infrastructure hardware arc — Dell Tuesday, HPE and Broadcom Wednesday — giving readers a fuller picture of how AI capex is flowing through servers, networking systems, and networking chips.
Build a Watchlist for This Week’s Top 10
Broadcom, Dell, MongoDB, Palo Alto Networks, Lululemon, and the rest of this week’s featured stocks all report within days of each other. TradingView lets you build a free watchlist, set price alerts, and follow live charts as each earnings report — and Friday’s jobs report — lands.
Open a Free TradingView Account →Sector Outlook
Technology, AI & Enterprise Software: The week’s central story. Broadcom, Dell, HPE, and Ciena earnings test the breadth of the AI-infrastructure buildout, while MongoDB, Snowflake, Palo Alto Networks, and Zscaler test whether enterprise software is capturing AI-driven demand.
Cybersecurity: A genuine head-to-head week, with Palo Alto Networks reporting Tuesday and Zscaler Thursday — a rare same-week comparison between the sector’s two leading platform vendors.
Consumer (Discretionary & Staples): The heaviest retail-earnings week of the month. Lululemon’s tariff-driven margin story and Brown-Forman’s outsized options-implied move offer two very different, equally data-rich reads on U.S. consumer health heading into the holidays.
Financials & Rate-Sensitive Sectors: Constructive but rate-path dependent. A confirmed September hike would extend net-interest-margin tailwinds for large banks but pressure utilities, REITs, and small-caps, which already fell harder than large-caps in the prior week’s rate-hike repricing.
Energy, Materials, Healthcare & Industrials: Comparatively quiet this week in terms of scheduled company-specific catalysts, but all remain sensitive to Friday’s jobs report through their shared exposure to interest rates and the broader growth outlook.
See the Sector Rotation as Earnings Roll In
AI-infrastructure hardware, enterprise software, cybersecurity, and tariff-exposed retail are pulling in different directions this week. TradingView’s screeners and heat maps make it easy to compare S&P 500 sectors side by side as Tuesday’s, Wednesday’s, and Thursday’s earnings — and Friday’s jobs report — come through.
Explore TradingView Charts →Biggest Risks to Watch This Week
The jobs report and Fed hike odds (Very High): Friday’s August jobs report is the week’s single largest wildcard. CME FedWatch odds of a September rate hike jumped to 57% after Jackson Hole, but July’s weak payrolls and ADP data argue the opposite case — a genuine, unresolved tension.
AI concentration risk (Very High): With so much of the market’s recent gains concentrated in AI-linked mega-caps, a disappointing Broadcom or Dell print could disproportionately move the Nasdaq and S&P 500.
Tariff-driven margin compression (High): Lululemon’s explicit 150-basis-point tariff headwind, alongside apparel peers like PVH and Victoria’s Secret, makes tariff cost pass-through one of the week’s clearest, most quantifiable risks.
Earnings guidance risk (High): MongoDB, Snowflake, Palo Alto Networks, Zscaler, Ciena, and HPE all carry options-implied moves of roughly 10% to 14%, signaling the market expects, and is bracing for, guidance-driven volatility.
Valuation (High): With the S&P 500 within roughly 1.3% of its record close, there’s limited room for earnings disappointments from this week’s heavily-weighted technology reporters.
Global rate decisions (Medium): The Bank of Canada and New Zealand’s central bank both meet this week; a hawkish surprise from either would reinforce the global rate-repricing theme already underway in the U.S.
Friday’s August jobs report is exactly the kind of event that can move the U.S. Dollar Index and Treasury yields within minutes — a strong print would likely firm up September rate-hike bets and lift the dollar, while a soft one could quickly unwind them. If you want to follow the dollar and yield-sensitive currency pairs directly rather than just the stocks they affect, Pepperstone offers live pricing on major FX pairs around the release.
Best Trade Setups to Watch: Bullish vs. Bearish
The ideas below reflect this week’s most talked-about setups based on scheduled catalysts and current positioning — not personalized investment advice. Every stock carries real two-way risk, and past patterns don’t guarantee future results.
| Bullish Setups | Bearish Setups |
|---|---|
| Broadcom (AVGO) — AI-networking guidance beat potential | Lululemon (LULU) — guided EPS decline, tariff margin hit |
| Dell Technologies (DELL) — AI-server backlog confirmation | PVH Corp. (PVH) — apparel tariff-cost exposure |
| MongoDB (MDB) — Atlas growth, potential fifth beat | Victoria’s Secret & Co. (VSCO) — apparel traffic softness |
| Palo Alto Networks (PANW) — platformization momentum | G-III Apparel (GIII) — tariff-exposed apparel importer |
| Ciena (CIEN) — optical-networking demand cross-check | Rate-sensitive REITs & small-caps (sector-level) — hike-odds risk |
Key Takeaways
- Broadcom reports Wednesday, September 2, guiding to roughly $29.4 billion in revenue (+84% year-over-year) — the week’s biggest single AI-infrastructure catalyst.
- Friday’s August jobs report is the week’s single most important release, with no CPI print until September 11 to compete for attention.
- Fed rate-hike odds for the September 16 meeting jumped to 57%, up from 39.9% a week earlier, even as July payrolls came in at just 57,000.
- Dell Technologies, MongoDB, and Palo Alto Networks all report Tuesday, September 1, giving readers three major catalysts before Broadcom even reports.
- MongoDB carries the largest options-implied move of any technology name this week, at 14.06%.
- Palo Alto Networks and Zscaler report within three days of each other, offering a rare head-to-head cybersecurity comparison.
- Lululemon’s guided 42.3% year-over-year EPS decline includes a 150-basis-point tariff headwind to gross margin.
- Brown-Forman’s options market prices a 15.98% earnings-day move — larger than any technology stock reporting this week.
Frequently Asked Questions
When does Broadcom report earnings this week?
Broadcom reports its fiscal third-quarter earnings after the market closes on Wednesday, September 2, 2026. Management has guided to roughly $29.4 billion in revenue, with Wall Street penciling in earnings per share near $3.24.
What is the August jobs report, and why does it matter this week?
The jobs report, officially the Employment Situation Summary, is a monthly release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that measures how many jobs the U.S. economy added and the unemployment rate. It lands Friday, September 4, and is the week’s single biggest event because it’s the last major labor-market signal before the Federal Reserve’s September 16 interest-rate decision.
Why did Fed rate-hike odds jump to 57%?
After Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole speech on August 28 — in which he emphasized the Fed’s commitment to its 2% inflation target and cited elevated PCE inflation readings — traders sharply raised the probability, tracked by the CME FedWatch tool, that the Fed will raise rates a quarter point at its September 16 meeting.
What does an ‘options-implied move’ mean?
An options-implied move is the size of price swing that options traders are collectively pricing in for a stock around a specific event, like earnings. When a stock’s implied move is unusually large compared to its historical average — as is the case with Brown-Forman and MongoDB this week — it signals the market expects a bigger-than-usual surprise, in either direction.
What is the current Federal Reserve interest rate?
As of this week, the Federal Reserve’s benchmark funds rate has held steady at a target range of 3.50% to 3.75%. Markets are now debating whether the Fed’s next move, on September 16, will be a quarter-point hike or a hold, following Chair Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole remarks.
Why does Lululemon face a tariff headwind?
Lululemon sources much of its apparel internationally, and current U.S. tariff policy raises the cost of importing those goods. Management has guided to a 150-basis-point hit to gross margin from tariffs this quarter, with only partial cost offsets, directly weighing on the company’s own earnings guidance for the period.
Which stocks are reporting earnings the week of August 31, 2026?
Notable companies reporting this week include Dell Technologies, MongoDB, and Palo Alto Networks on Tuesday; Broadcom, Snowflake, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and Brown-Forman on Wednesday; and Ciena, Zscaler, and Lululemon on Thursday, alongside NetApp, Five Below, Campbell’s, RH, and several other names.
Related Reading
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- Top 10 Forex Pairs and Commodities to Watch This Week (August 24–28, 2026)
- Crypto Market Outlook: Bitcoin Nears $80K Ahead of a Pivotal Fed Speech
Conclusion
The week of August 31–September 4, 2026 sits at a genuine hinge point for U.S. markets, between last week’s hawkish Jackson Hole surprise and the September 16 Fed decision it now heavily influences. A dense “second wave” of AI-infrastructure and enterprise-software earnings — led by Broadcom on Wednesday alongside Dell, HPE, Ciena, MongoDB, Snowflake, Palo Alto Networks, and Zscaler — will test whether the capital-spending cycle Nvidia and Marvell validated the week before has genuine breadth. But the week’s true center of gravity is Friday’s jobs report: with rate-hike odds and soft labor data pointing in opposite directions, this single release will do more than any earnings print to determine where markets head into mid-September.
Disclosure: The content on this page was produced with AI writing assistance under the editorial direction of a licensed Electrical Engineering practitioner and certified investor in different markets with over a decade of experience. All articles are reviewed and approved by the author before publication.
