January jobs data, Alphabet and Amazon earnings, more Warsh fallout: What to watch this week
- - January jobs data, Alphabet and Amazon earnings, more Warsh fallout: What to watch this week
Jake ConleyFebruary 1, 2026 at 7:47 PM
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The major indexes ended Friday in the red — but the week little-changed — as investors digested a tech sell-off, wild trading in silver and gold, and the long-awaited news that President Trump will nominate financial markets stalwart Kevin Warsh to be the next chair of the Federal Reserve.
The tech-focused Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) led the way down on Friday with a loss of roughly 1% after a steep tech sell-off on Thursday. The index ended the week down roughly 0.2%.
Meanwhile, the S&P 500 (^GSPC) lost around 0.4% on Friday but still finished the week up a cumulative 0.3%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) shed roughly 0.4% in the week's final session, logging a weekly decline of roughly the same magnitude.
Warsh's nomination early Friday capped off months of market speculation, and the 55-year-old former Fed governor is widely seen as a conservative choice by the president. In response to Warsh's nomination, the dollar (DX-Y.NYB) picked up about 0.8% on Friday.
Elsewhere in the market, gold (GC=F) sold off by more than 9% on Friday in a turnaround for precious metals. Friday's drop also saw silver (SI=F) and platinum (PL=F) lose more than 28% and 19%, respectively.
Oil prices (BZ=F, CL=F) rose roughly 7% over the past five days on tensions around potential US military action in Iran and possible disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz.
Some of the week's biggest stock market swings came from the biggest names in tech.
While both Meta (META) and Microsoft (MSFT) announced even higher spending targets in their fourth quarter earnings reports, Meta ended the week up 8.8%, while Microsoft went the other way, sliding to a loss of 7.6% on the week. The software sector also faced heavy selling pressure through the week after results from industry giant SAP (SAP), as well as other names like ServiceNow (NOW), failed to calm investor fears that software companies are quickly losing ground to AI.
In the week ahead, investors' attention will be focused on Friday's jobs report. Economists expect the US economy added 65,000 jobs last month, with the unemployment rate set to hold at 4.4%.
Readings on the manufacturing and services sector, as well as consumer sentiment from the University of Michigan, will also feature.
In the corporate world, another busy week of earnings awaits investors as two more "Magnificent Seven" companies — Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL) and Amazon (AMZN) — report earnings, alongside other tech heavyweights including Palantir (PLTR) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD).
Walt Disney (DIS), PepsiCo (PEP), Eli Lilly (LLY), Novo Nordisk (NVO), Toyota (TM), and Philip Morris (PM) are also set to report.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks during a news conference, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026, at the Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin) ()'A strong pedigree to be chair of the Federal Reserve'
Market reaction to Trump's appointment of former Fed official Kevin Warsh to lead the central bank was largely muted. The dollar held on to gains, but stocks moved down Friday on a wave of other news; gold tumbled in a metals sell-off that analysts have called a necessary correction.
"Warsh has a strong pedigree to be chair of the Federal Reserve, with a background somewhat similar to Chair Powell," Deutsche Bank economists wrote in a client note.
If confirmed by the Senate, Warsh will step into a Fed divided over the path of interest rates, with multiple officials voting against the central bank's policy decision at its last several meetings.
While Warsh has more recently called for lower interest rates and a re-work of the central bank, his earlier tenure as a governor showed a preference for a more hawkish stance on policy with a focus on the risks of high inflation.
Warsh noted in a recent speech before the IMF that the decision by the Fed, then chaired by Ben Bernanke, to move toward quantitative easing in the aftermath of the financial crisis was what ultimately pushed Warsh to resign from the central bank.
"There is a sense that a Warsh Fed technically leans more hawkish with an unwillingness to utilize the balance sheet to cap long-term rates," Allianz Investment Management senior investment strategist Charlie Ripley wrote in emailed commentary. "With inflation risks continuing to loom on the horizon, balancing political pressures to reduce policy rates will remain a challenge."
Warsh will now have to face a Senate confirmation process that could be held up if North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican, maintains his stance that he will not vote for the next Fed chair until the Justice Department resolves its investigation into Fed Chair Powell.
Kevin Warsh, speaking to the media about his report on transparency at the Bank of England, in London, Dec., 11, 2014. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, Pool, File) ()'A single macro bet on AI'
Throughout the economy, it's starting to feel like all roads lead to AI.
Investors will get another read on Big Tech's willingness to throw money at the opportunity when Alphabet and Amazon report earnings on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively. Like their "Mag Seven" brethren, the two companies are expected to boost their capex estimates as they jockey for position in the AI arms race unfolding.
"Fears about 'AI ROI' have returned to the fore, raising questions about valuations," Capital analyst Kyle Rodda wrote in email commentary, noting the market's harsh reaction to Microsoft's spending numbers. "It implies diminishing pay-offs from AI investments and less growth at a time when valuations are at extremes and the market is almost priced to perfection."
Ballooning spending is also beginning to stress the debt markets, said Apollo chief economist Torsten Sløk, writing in a note Friday morning that AI's turn toward debt funding is "increasing concentration and correlation risk." (Disclosure: Yahoo Finance is owned by Apollo Global Management.)
"AI-related exposure is becoming pervasive across portfolios, with apparent diversification across issuers and sectors increasingly masking a single macro bet on AI," Slok wrote. "What began as a largely self-funded capex cycle is quickly becoming a financing event."
And there is the raw material side of the AI equation.
Alongside the tech companies themselves, investors will continue to watch trading in the commodities underpinning the AI build-out.
Prices across both precious and base metals have soared over the past few of months, even with Friday's sharp downturn.
The labor market and economic growth impacts of AI also warrant close watching.
Job growth was substantially weaker in 2025 than the year prior, with 584,000 additions to payroll employment in 2025 compared to 2024's 2 million additions, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Yet, at the same time, GDP is growing. The economic growth indicator increased at an annual rate of 4.4% in the third quarter of 2025, against the second quarter's annual rate of 3.8%, raising questions about where productivity is coming from — and what it should be attributed to.
Investors will get a read on fourth quarter GDP movement in February.
"The US economy is producing at a very high level and the 4.4% real growth rate is much higher than normal and is likely to moderate over the course of the year, but if we can stay above 3% for the entire year it could lead to double-digit returns in the stock market," Northlight Asset Management chief investment officer Chris Zaccarelli wrote in emailed commentary.
"It is often said that the stock market is not the economy and vice versa. However, higher corporate profits do drive stock prices and to the extent a sustainable increase in productivity and output allow companies to meaningfully increase profits, we should expect the market to increase as well."
A computer screen displays Meta logo and a mobile phone screen displays founder of Meta Mark Zuckerberg in the foreground in Ankara, Turkiye on October 28, 2025. (Photo by Arda Kucukkaya/Anadolu via Getty Images) (Anadolu via Getty Images)Economic and earnings calendarMonday
Economic data: S&P Global manufacturing PMI, January, final reading (51.9 previously); ISM manufacturing, January (48.3 expected, 47.9 previously)
Earnings calendar: Palantir (PLTR), Walt Disney (DIS), Mizuho Financial (MFG), Simon Property Group (SPG), NXP Semiconductors (NXPI), IDEXX Laboratories (IDXX), Teradyne (TER), Tyson Foods (TSN), Hess Midstream LP (HESM)
Tuesday
Economic data: JOLTS job openings, December (+7.3 million expected, +7.15 million previously); JOLTS quits level, December (+3.16 million previously); JOLTS layoffs level, December (+1.69 million previously); Wards total vehicle sales, January (15.4 million expected, 16.02 million previously)
Earnings calendar: Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Merck (MRK), PepsiCo (PEP), Amgen (AMGN), Pfizer (PFE), Eaton Corporation (ETN), Chubb (CB), Emerson Electric (EMR), TransDigm (TDG), Illinois Tool Works (ITW), Mondelez International (MDLZ), Suncor Energy (SU), Marathon Petroleum (MPC), Chipotle (CMG), Electronic Arts (EA), PayPal (PYPL), Corteva (CTVA), Prudential Financial (PRU), Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM), Super Micro Computer (SMCI), Galaxy Digital (GLXY)
Wednesday
Economic data: MBA mortgage applications, week ended Jan. 30 (-8.5% previously); ADP employment change, January (+45,000 expected, +41,000 previously); S&P Global US services PMI, January, final reading (52.5 previously); ISM services index, January (53.3 expected, 54.4 previously)
Earnings calendar: Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL), Eli Lilly (LLY), AbbVie (ABBV), Novartis (NVS), Novo Nordisk (NVO), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial (MUFG), Uber Technologies (UBER), Qualcomm (QCOM), UBS Group (UBS), Boston Scientific (BSX), Arm Holdings (ARM), CME Group (CME), McKesson (MCK), GSK (GSK), O'Reilly Automotive (ORLY), Brookfield Asset Management (BAM), Equinor (EQNR), Phillips 66 (PSX), Aflac (AFL), AllState (ALL), MetLife (MET), Yum! Brands (YUM), Fox Corporation (FOX), Equifax (EFX), T. Rowe Price (TROW)
Thursday
Economic data: Challenger job cuts, year-on-year, January (-8.3% previously); Initial jobless claims, week ended Jan. 31 (213,000 expected, 209,000 previously); Continuing claims, week ended Jan. 24 (1.85 million expected, 1.83 million previously)
Earnings calendar: Amazon (AMZN), Shell (SHEL), Linde (LIN), Sony Group (SONY), ConocoPhillips (COP), Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY), KKR (KKR), Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), Barrick Mining (B), Cummins (CMI), The Cigna Group (CI), Monolithic Power Systems (MPWR), Roblox (RBLX), Thomson Reuters (TRI), Cardinal Health (CAH), Ares Management (ARES), Rockwell Automation (ROK), Xcel Energy (XEL), Microchip (MCHP), Estée Lauder (EL), Strategy (MSTR), The Hershey Company (HSY), Reddit (RDDT), Kenvue (KVUE), Blue Owl Capital (OBDC), Ralph Lauren (RL), The Carlyle Group (CG), Affirm (AFRM)
Friday
Economic data: Change in nonfarm payrolls, January (+65,000 expected, +50,000 previously); Unemployment rate, January (4.4% expected, 4.4% previously); Average hourly earnings, month-on-month, January (+0.3% expected, +0.3% previously); Average hourly earnings, year-on-year, January (+3.8% previously); University of Michigan sentiment, February preliminary reading (55.0 expected, 56.4 previously)
Earnings calendar: Toyota (TM), Philip Morris (PM), Ubiquiti (UI), Cboe Global Markets (CBOE), Biogen (BIIB), AerCap Holdings (AER), Centene (CNC), nVent Electric (NVT), Roivant Sciences (ROIV), Plains All American Pipeline (PAA), AutoNation (AN), MarketAxess Holdings (MKTX), Piper Sandler (PIPR), Under Armour (UAA)
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