News & Insight • Weekly Newsletters

06 February 2026 | William Buckhurst

That Was The Week That Was

MACRO NEWS

The Bank of England left interest rates unchanged at 3.75%, but the vote was closer than expected, with the split 5-4 to keep rates unchanged against a further cut of 0.25%. Governor Andrew Bailey stated that a 50% chance of the rate cut in March was “not a bad place to be” while minutes from the meeting noted that there was “evidence of subdued economic growth and building slack in the labour market”.

The ECB also left interest rates unchanged at 2%, which is its long-time target. ECB President Christine Lagarde stated that inflation was in a “good place” while noting that officials discussed the Euro during the week, reiterating that they were not targeting a particular exchange rate while acknowledging that a stronger Euro “could bring inflation down”.

The US ISM Manufacturing index for January was 52.6 vs 48.5, its best reading since 2022 and a large jump on the prior month. The data showed that the strength in demand reflected a decline in customer inventories, which contracted the most since mid-2022 while the report noted that “although these are positive signs for the start of the year, they are tempered by commentary citing that January is a reorder month after the holidays, and some buying appears to be to get ahead of expected price increases due to ongoing tariff issues.” The ISM Services Index was 53.8 vs 53.5 expected.

Japan went to the polls on Sunday (8^th) and Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi won a majority. Closer to home Starmer’s days look numbered due to the Peter Scandalson.

COMPANY NEWS

Disney reported first quarter results with earnings above expectations and sales in line. Experiences (theme parks) income was solid, but they blamed the lack of tourists in the US; Sports beat. The company reaffirmed full year guidance for earnings growth.

Estee Lauder was not in fashion as the shares fell 19.2% after reporting second quarter results that in the main were better than expected but guidance was very weak.

AMD fell 17.3% even with earnings better than noted and revenue rising 34% to $10.3bn, above consensus estimates. However, guidance was worse than targeted.

Sony reacted positively after posting results and issuing guidance ahead of consensus estimates despite the concerns of margin pressures caused by memory prices.

Most healthcare stocks are performing well, even GSK is showing signs of life. Shares in Bristol Myers Squibb rose 3.3% on results that were ahead of expectations as one of its main drugs (Revlimid) fell less than feared. On the flip side Novo Nordisk had a tough week, bringing their results forward and disclosing good profits but warning about the competitive landscape, forecasting full year sales declining 5-13% vs the 1.4% predicted decline. It then fell further following reports that US firm Hims & Hers were set to launch a copycat version of its new Wegovy pill at a much lower price - $49 per month compared to $149.

Shares in Uber hit the brakes even with revenue rising 20% to $14.4bn. Guidance was slightly under, and Delivery bookings were lower than forecast.

Orsted stated that it would sell its European onshore business to Danish investor Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners for €1.4bn to shore up its balance sheet.

PayPal fell 20% after reporting underwhelming results and announcing a management change by replacing CEO Alex Chriss, who only took the job in 2023, with current HP Inc CEO Enrique Lores.

Staples are performing better, and Pepsi rose 4.9% after reporting results above expectations and announced a $10bn share buyback programme.

WHERE IS SOFTWARE GOING?

In a nod to the late snooker commentator John Virgo and his famous saying ‘where is the cue ball going’ it was noticeable that post the latest Claude update from AI upstarts, Anthropic, that several shares in the software sector were disappearing into the pocket. After revealing new capabilities for its Cowork product for the legal sector, it stated it can automate contract work and legal briefings.

This coincided with some underwhelming results from consultancy firm, Gartner, which showed a deceleration in contract value growth sending the shares down over 20%. London listed data companies such as RELX (which own Reed Elsevier), Experian (credit checks) and even the London Stock Exchange all fell over 12%. International companies in similar sectors also fell.

CLOUD CAPEX

Oracle has been under a cloud since it announced its capital expenditure plans without a credible plan to pay for it. They finally confirmed it planned to raise $45-$50bn to fund requirements and converting its backlog. It is expected to borrow $20-$25bn (some of which will have long maturities) and raise around the same amount via equity sales.

In other sector financing related news, Nvidia finished 2.9% lower following reported comments over the weekend from CEO Jensen Huang that his outlined $100bn investment in OpenAI was “never a commitment” and that they would invest one step at a time. If so, OpenAI will find life tough.

Shares in Alphabet marked time despite reporting excellent results with Cloud performance materially exceeding expectations with only YouTube performance below estimates as investors focused on guidance for a massive increase in capex in 2026 to as much as $185bn.

Amazon then blew everyone out of the water by announcing an increase in capital expenditure to $200bn up from $131bn. Although the results were very good, beating against most metrics the shares fell 5.6%.

THE WEEK AHEAD

The CPI data in the US for January is released on Wednesday

At the start of the week, we will have the results from Japan’s general election.

Earnings reports expected from BP, Astra Zeneca, RELX and Unilever in the UK. In the US we have Cisco, Applied Materials, Coca Cola and McDonalds. In Europe, Ferrari, L’Oreal, Kering and Deutsche Bourse are all up.

THE WEEK IN HISTORY

1971: The NASDAQ stock market begins trading, initially as an electronic quotation system rather than a physical exchange.

2018: The Dow Jones drops 1,175 points (4.6%), its largest one-day points drop ever, triggered by fears of rising interest rates and the collapse of volatility-linked investment products.