By
Joel South
Sep 15, 2025 | Updated 10:49 AM ET
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Key Points
- Chinese and U.S. representatives held trade talks over the weekend, but made no clear progress.
- Investors await news of a Fed interest rate cut this week.
- Are you ahead, or behind on retirement? SmartAsset’s free tool can match you with a financial advisor in minutes to help you answer that today. Each advisor has been carefully vetted, and must act in your best interests. Don’t waste another minute; get started by clicking here.(Sponsor)
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Buffett + Dimon + Trump?
Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett. JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon. President … Donald Trump. These are three names you don’t often find all in the same sentence together, but today, President Trump echoed past sentiments expressed by both Buffett and Dimon when he mused on Truth Social that U.S. companies would be better served making semiannual earnings reports than reporting earnings quarterly.
In 2018, Buffett and Dimon co-authored an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, arguing that “in our experience, quarterly earnings guidance often leads to an unhealthy focus on short-term profits at the expense of long-term strategy, growth and sustainability.”
Now Trump is seconding the emotion, opining that “China has a 50 to 100 year view on management of a company, whereas we run our companies on a quarterly basis??? Not good!!!.”
Whether anything comes of the idea remains to be seen, however.
Eaton Stock Upgraded
A second Melius analyst, Scott R. Davis, upgraded Eaton Corporation (NYSE: ETN) to buy with a price target of $495 today. As with the GE Vernova upgrade, AI is the reason: “Given reaccelerating AI capex news flow and a less demanding valuation, [Melius’s previous] concerns have dissipated.”
It’s unclear what “dissipation” Melius is talking about. The stock is down only about 4% from its recent high in late July, and has actually been climbing for the past two weeks.
In any case, Eaton stock is up more than 1% on today’s upgrade.
GE Vernova Upgraded
Melius analyst Rob Wertheimer upgraded GE Vernova (NYSE: GEV) to buy with a $740 price target this morning.
“Obviously the world appreciates the AI story a bit more today,” commented the analyst. “We see upside to estimates over the next few years, and a longer tail seemingly developing on the need for power.” Melius values GE stock at approximately 20x 2028 earnings, the year “when more of the pricing power starts to show.”
GE Vernova stock opened nearly 1% higher today. The Voo opened up 0.4%.
This article will be updated throughout the day, so check back often for more daily updates.
U.S. and Chinese representatives met over the weekend to continue wrangling over trade issues, and both governments seem to be using their counterparties’ companies as bargaining chips in the talks. From the U.S. side, there’s discussion of removing the ban on TikTok if China accepts higher tariffs on its exports — or proceeding to ban the company from operating in the U.S. if China balks. Meanwhile, the Chinese side has countered by opening a probe into Nvidia (Nasdaq: NVDA), alleging the semiconductors giant is violating China’s anti-monopoly laws in some manner.
Tesla‘s (Nasdaq: TSLA) also in the news today, after Elon Musk spent $1 billion of his own money buying up Tesla shares. The CEO’s enthusiasm for his own electric car company is lifting Tesla stock nearly 8% premarket.
The week’s biggest news, however, hasn’t happened yet. On Thursday, the Federal Open Markets Committee is expected to announce a 0.25% reduction in its target interest rate. Investors see this move as basically in the bag, and are still in a buying mood because of it:
Premarket, the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEMKT: VOO) is already up 0.3%.
Earnings
Earnings season is basically over at this point — but another one is just around the bend. This morning, Alaska Air (NYSE: ALK) warned that higher fuel costs combined with operational challenges will weigh on its quarterly profit.
The carrier had previously predicted profits between $1 and $1.40 this quarter. Now it confirms profits will be closer to the $1 than to the $1.40, despite strong quarterly revenue. Alaska Air stock is down nearly 1% on the news.