JPMorgan Blowout Kicks Off Wall Street’s Big CPI, Warsh Day

JPMorgan and Wells Fargo crush Q2 estimates as Wall Street braces for June CPI at 6:00 PM IST and Fed Chair Warsh’s inaugural congressional testimony.

TLDR

Wall Street walked into Tuesday facing a rare triple stack in a single pre-market window. JPMorgan and Wells Fargo cleared Q2 estimates by wide margins before the bell, Bank of America followed with its own beat, and Citigroup plus Goldman Sachs are still on deck. At 6:00 PM IST the Bureau of Labor Statistics drops June CPI, the last inflation print before the July 28 to 29 FOMC. At 7:30 PM IST, Kevin Warsh gives his first congressional testimony as Fed chair. Overnight, Japan and South Korea staged a V-shaped recovery after Monday’s shakeout, and US futures point higher into the open with US100 up around 0.7 percent and US500 up around 0.5 percent.

Market Regime

The tape is caught between two clean stories. On one side, banks are printing their strongest Q2 in years, riding a SpaceX-fueled investment banking cycle, healthy trading revenue, and stable net interest margins. On the other side, June inflation still has to land. Consensus wants a headline reading close to negative 0.1 percent month over month, dragged down by a 10 percent gasoline decline that already looks stale after Trump reinstated the Iran shipping blockade this weekend and crude ripped through 77 dollars. Core CPI is expected to hold at 2.9 percent year over year, well above the Fed’s 2 percent target.

That divergence is the setup Kevin Warsh inherits. Nine of eighteen FOMC participants now project at least one more rate hike before year-end. CME FedWatch shows roughly 33 percent odds of a July hike and 69 percent by September. A soft headline reading paired with sticky core would let bulls celebrate the surface number while bond markets keep pricing in higher for longer. A hot print would push the July hike debate back into play just as Warsh takes the stand.

Bullish Factors

• JPMorgan Q2 blowout: EPS of $6.14 against a $5.85 estimate on revenue of $58.02 billion versus $50.19 billion expected. One of the largest revenue beats in recent memory.
• Wells Fargo cleared the bar too: $2.00 EPS against $1.72, revenue $22.62 billion against $21.84 billion, with Charlie Scharf’s expansion story now leaning on real numbers.
• Bank of America beat as well: $1.21 EPS versus $1.13, revenue $31.7 billion versus $30.72 billion consensus.
• Softer headline CPI in view: if consensus lands, the annual headline inflation rate falls to roughly 3.9 percent from May’s 4.2 percent, giving equities a friendlier tape on print.
• Asian V-shape overnight: Nikkei 225 closed up 0.74 percent and Kospi up 0.73 percent after both opened sharply lower, signaling that oversold conditions found buyers.
• SpaceX IPO tailwind is still paying off: the June 12 debut at $86 billion raised handed underwriting fees to nearly every major bank reporting this week and next.

Bearish Factors

• Iran blockade takes effect today: Trump’s 20 percent shipper fee through the Strait of Hormuz kicks in with a 24-hour notice clock that started Monday. Any oil supply headline can flip the tape.
• Sticky core inflation: core CPI is expected to hold at 2.9 percent year over year with services and shelter still doing the heavy lifting, and the Fed cares far more about this than headline.
• Warsh’s inaugural: the new Fed chair’s first public read on inflation is a live event risk. Any hawkish framing at 7:30 PM IST could snap the equity bid.
• Semiconductor whitelist: the FT reported NVIDIA is cutting its Asian customer list for AI chips by more than half, tightening compliance ahead of any further US-China export moves.
• Bank stocks not celebrating: JPMorgan traded slightly lower premarket despite the beat, Wells Fargo down 1 percent, Bank of America flat. The bar was already set very high.

Asian Markets This Morning

Asia flipped script from Monday’s rout. Both major North Asian benchmarks opened deep in the red on lingering Iran risk and Monday’s tech drawdown, then reversed intraday as bargain hunters stepped in. Nikkei 225 closed higher by 0.74 percent, and South Korea’s Kospi closed up 0.73 percent, both erasing early losses that at one stage saw the Nikkei drop below 66,000 and the Kospi trade around 6,639.

The recovery leaned on the semiconductor and AI cohort. SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son used an annual Tokyo conference to project that AI infrastructure investment will reach 5 trillion dollars a year by 2040, dismissing bubble concerns as, in his words, ridiculous. Hang Seng advanced through the session and China’s Shanghai Composite held flat, with June trade data confirming that AI-linked export demand is still growing faster than expected. Australia’s ASX 200 finished little changed, and India’s Nifty 50 futures were steady.

What Moved Wall Street Yesterday

Monday belonged to oil and geopolitics. President Trump reinstated what he called an Iranian blockade after weekend strikes near the Strait of Hormuz, with a 20 percent fee on any cargo shipped through the corridor. Crude spiked, energy names rallied, and every other risk pocket sold off. The S&P 500 closed down 0.79 percent at 7,515.34, the Nasdaq Composite lost 1.55 percent to 25,873.18, the Dow dipped 0.26 percent to 52,498.64, and the Russell 2000 fell 0.83 percent to 2,953.27.

Semiconductors led the drag. SK Hynix ADRs fell 9.32 percent in New York after a 13 percent debut pop on Friday, and the Korean listing shed 15 percent overnight, triggering circuit breakers in Seoul. That single-name pain rippled across the memory and broader AI complex, with investors questioning whether the AI capex cycle can absorb another energy shock. Energy was the standout winner: the SPDR Energy Select fund rose about 3 percent as crude oil futures climbed above 77 dollars. Financials held up better than the tape into today’s earnings block, with Utilities the only S&P 500 sector to finish clearly positive.

Assets in Focus

NVDA

Nvidia is trading a two-front story. The Financial Times report that the company has trimmed its authorized Asian customer list by more than half tightens the export compliance narrative, particularly around China-facing intermediaries. Against that, Son’s 5 trillion dollar AI capex projection and the reminder that hyperscaler builds still need Nvidia’s stack keeps the demand case intact. ASML’s Q2 report tomorrow before the US open and TSM on Wednesday will refine the read on AI hardware demand into Q3.

TSLA

Tesla has been the earnings anchor traders are staring past this week, with the print due after the close on July 22. The near-term driver is the delivery beat that landed early this month and the sell-the-news drop that followed. Any incremental Fed-hike pricing after today’s CPI feeds directly into duration-sensitive names, and Tesla remains one of the most rate-sensitive megacaps in the tape.

META

Meta ran hard on Friday after SemiAnalysis published a bullish note on its AI compute business, and it is holding the gains through Monday’s tape. The lead into month-end earnings on July 29 (subject to IR confirmation) leaves the stock in a technical uptrend but exposed to any hawkish CPI reaction that punishes long-duration compounders.

AAPL

Apple reports on July 30 with the calendar putting it directly on top of both the Q2 GDP advance estimate and the Bank of Japan decision. Shares are up roughly 18 percent year to date and the setup into the print is tighter than the tape suggests. Any pull-forward from the June Mac pricing action reported earlier in the summer will be a focus on the call.

NSDQ100

The Nasdaq 100 sits inside a rising range with semi-driven downside pressure Monday but a supportive futures tape into Tuesday’s open. US100 futures point to a roughly 0.7 percent gain premarket. A cool headline CPI paired with stable core keeps the index bid, while a hot core reading is the direct risk factor. Reference points for the Nasdaq Composite: 26,300 as recent resistance, 25,500 as first support, 25,000 as major support.

XLE

Energy has been the sole clean beneficiary of the Iran escalation. XLE gained about 3 percent Monday as crude spiked. The blockade officially starts today with the 20 percent shipper fee, which puts a floor under crude in the near term but keeps the sector exposed to any ceasefire headline that reverses the move sharply.

Index Levels to Watch

S&P 500 (7,515 close)

• Immediate resistance: 7,580 (last week’s high)
• First support: 7,470 (June breakout retest)
• Major support: 7,380 (rising 50-day area)

Nasdaq 100 futures

• Immediate resistance: 26,300 (recent range top)
• First support: 25,600 (Monday session low)
• Major support: 25,000 (psychological and 50-day cluster)

Nikkei 225 (67,752 close today)

• Immediate resistance: 68,600 (July high area)
• First support: 67,000 (Monday intraday low)
• Major support: 66,000 (last week’s swing low)

Disclaimer

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