Stocks and Recovery

What is up for this week?

I reckon analysts don't have very high expectations, for this week. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (SPX 879.13, -3.55, -0.40%) and Dow Jones Industrial Average (INDU 8,147, -36.65, -0.45%) fell for a fourth consecutive week this past week, the longest string of declines since the doldrums in March.

So? The movement will largely be dictated by the reports of tech stocks, mainly:

• Intel on Tuesday (INTC 16.04, +0.02, +0.12%) is expected to report second-quarter earnings and sales; analysts believe demand may be returning to the battered market following a sharp slowdown in demand for high-tech goods.
• Internet-search juggernaut Google Inc. (GOOG 414.40, +4.05, +0.99%) will report on Thursday.
• Financial firms including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. ; Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reports on Wednesday, and is expected to come through the market collapse mostly intact, we hope.

Markets have been led by a creeping realization that the economy, in the U.S. and abroad, won't rebound as quickly or as robustly as many had previously hoped. That was, in part, underlined by the U.S. payrolls report on July 2 that said the economy shed many more jobs than had been anticipated.

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IMF reports that the global wipe out finally seems to be receding. "The world economy is stabilizing," its global economic growth projection of 2.5 percent in 2010 is 0.6 points higher than predicted in April. But the global economy isn't expected to gain its footing in earnest until the second half of 2010.

So? Let wait, hope and see.