An intense week full of positive quarterly results, in which we continue to follow the evolution of oil prices

We continue with the quarterly results season, where we are finding that, in general, results are better than expected. However, the forecasts for the final stretch of the year are deteriorating due to the various problems that the market is facing. These problems include: the energy and microchip crisis, high inflation and, of course, the evolution of the pandemic and the arrival of the winter period in the northern hemisphere.  

However, for the moment, the results are quite positive. Today, Apple will be the main protagonist as it presents its results at the close of the market. In addition to Facebook's results that we discussed last Tuesday, among the results presented throughout this week we can highlight:  

• On Tuesday, Microsoft presented its results for the third quarter of the year in which it once again obtained a better result than expected by the market consensus. On this occasion, the company founded by Bill Gates achieved earnings per share (EPS) of 2.27 dollars and revenue of 45,320 million.  
• Google's parent company, Alphabet, also presented its third quarter results on Tuesday. In these results, Alphabet exceeded all market expectations by posting EPS of $27.99 compared to the $23.75 anticipated. In addition, revenue was also much higher than expected at $65.12 billion.  
• On Tuesday, Visa once again demonstrated its strength by presenting positive quarterly results. Specifically, Visa reported EPS of $1.62 and revenue of $6.56 billion, compared to $1.55 per share and $6.52 billion anticipated.  
• Yesterday was the turn of Coca-Cola. These results were also better than expected withEPS of 0.65 dollars and revenue of 10.04 billion compared to the anticipated 0.57 dollars per share and 9.78 billion.  
• From yesterday's session, we should also highlight the results presented by McDonald's, as they presented positive results, achieving EPS of 2.76 dollars and revenue of $6.2 billion.  

During today's session, we have also known the results of Repsol, which have been greatly boosted by the rise in the price of oil and gas. This helped Repsol achieve a net profit of 623 million euros, thus being the best quarterly result since the end of 2018. These positive results have led the company to announce an increase in its dividend and share buyback programme over the coming months.  

During this week, it seems that the price of crude oil is taking a breather. Price has fallen just over 2% since Monday, after experiencing a strong upward rally in recent weeks that has taken it to levels not seen since September 2018 of around 87 dollars per barrel of Brent.  

As we can see in the weekly chart below, after the strong rises of the last few weeks, it seems that the price has found resistance this week at the highs of 2018. Although forecasts indicate that the price of a barrel of Brent could exceed 100 dollars over the next few weeks, for the moment, we cannot rule out that the price will make a slight correction to alleviate the accumulated overbought levels, however, the sentiment will continue to be positive.  

For the time being, we cannot expect a strong bullish momentum until the price manages to break above its current resistance level represented by the green band.  

Evolution of the last five years: 

• 2020: -21.52%
• 2019: 22.68%
• 2018: -19.55%
• 2017: 17.69%
• 2016: 52.41%

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