But a team of analysts at Goldman Sachs Group see hope for individual companies that could manage to buck the trend by delivering on four areas of critical importance to investors.
Profit margins will be key Corporate profit margins are being squeezed by the worst bout of inflation in four decades. Last quarter, margins for S&P 500 firms retreated by 11.2% at the index level, surpassing expectations for an 11.1% drop. Strategies for improving pricing power, enacting cost cuts or imposing more disciplined expense-management will likely be rewarded.
“One new potential boon to margins could be the gradual adoption of generative artificial intelligence by companies to automate manual tasks and boost labor efficiency,” they said. Is China’s reopening making a difference? Chinese officials including President Xi Jinping have promised a powerful reopening. Amid signs of slowdown in the all-important U.S. services sector, as well as in other parts of the economy, companies could look to China for a boost.
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