The Week Ahead: Walmart Aims to Exceed Expectations Again This Quarter

Earnings season continues this week with large companies in retail, media, and software reporting.

Walmart WMT reports earnings on Thursday and is looking to continue exceeding expectations as it has the past two quarters. Last week, the wide-moat retailer announced its grocery delivery membership program in 1,400 stores to compete with Amazon Fresh. With holiday season approaching, Walmart began launching Black Friday deals and is offering one-day free shipping to all shoppers.

Soon-to-be-merged media companies CBS CBS and Viacom VIA report earnings on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively. The merger is expected to close in early December, and the firm will be known as ViacomCBS.

Cisco CSCO announces earnings after recently extending its existing partnership with Microsoft's MSFT Azure and Office365. With Cisco's wide-area network, Microsoft Office365 has improved performance up to 40%.

Tyson Foods TSN reports on Tuesday. Recently, Tyson announced a partnership with Proforest in a sustainability effort to reduce deforestation, and it began building a $300 million meat facility in Utah. Tyson also announced a new president, Dean Banks, who joins the firm from Alphabet GOOG.

In other news, the National Federation of Independent Business releases the small-business optimism survey Tuesday. The Labor Department's monthly update on inflation and October consumer prices will be released Wednesday.