WED, JUL 19, 2023

MORNING SQUAWK

1. Lucky 7

The Dow continued its hot streak Tuesday, scoring its seventh-consecutive positive day to finish at its highest point since April 2022. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq also notched their highest closings since that same month. Wall Street seems to be vibing on what’s shaping up to be a soft landing as the Federal Reserve battles inflation with rate hikes. While earnings season is young, it, too, has been better than expected so far. More big names are on the way Wednesday, including Netflix and Tesla after the close. Follow live market updates.

2. New merger rules

The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission laid out new guidelines on how the respective agencies will approach mergers. Both institutions – under Jonathan Kanter and Lina Khan, respectively – have taken a hard line against what they view as anti-competitive behavior. Yet their record is a mixed bag so far, with the FTC experiencing a series of defeats in its attempt to block Microsoft’s nearly $70 billion acquisition of video game maker Activision Blizzard. The new guidelines include 13 points the regulators will use to determine whether a merger should be blocked. Read them here.

3. Goldman's turn

Goldman Sachs is set to report second quarter earnings at around 7:30 a.m. ET Wednesday. The report comes after a series of bad headlines out of the bank and its CEO, David Solomon. Goldman has struggled with investment banking and trading, two of its core businesses, as of late. The bank is also working through the fallout from its largely failed sojourn into consumer banking, warning investors that it faces impairment charges. So expectations are low for Goldman as big bank earnings wrap up.

4. Microsoft's AI high

Microsoft shares closed at a record high Tuesday after the tech giant released higher prices for its new artificial intelligence subscription service, called Copilot, for Microsoft 365. The stock is now up 50% for the year, reflecting investors’ bullishness over Microsoft’s investment in ChatGPT maker OpenAI. Copilot, which the company announced in March, is a generative AI assistant intended to complement Microsoft’s suite of office programs, such as Excel and Word. It’s not clear, though, when Microsoft will roll out the new service.

5. Russia hammers Odesa, Kyiv

Russian forces ramped up their aerial assault on Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the port city of Odesa. The Odesa strikes come on the heels of Russia’s withdrawal from the Black Sea grain deal that allowed Ukraine to export tons of agriculturual products to several countries. “The Russian terror of Odessa proves once again that they need hunger and problems in the countries of the Global South. They want to create a refugee crisis for the West,” said Andriy Yermak, a top aide to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Follow live war updates.

— CNBC’s Mike Calia wrote this newsletter. Sarah Min, Lauren Feiner, Hugh Son, Hayden Field, Todd Haselton and Natasha Turak contributed.

— Follow Squawk Pod for the best conversations and analysis from Squawk Box in a curated, daily podcast.

900 Sylvan Avenue, Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632

Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes. Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes and Market Data and Analysis.

Data also provided by THOMSON REUTERS