Despite the first confirmed case of Ebola in New York City last night which had S&P 500 and Dow futures down, the markets opened higher this morning on more good news from corporations. United Parcel Service continued the run of impressive earnings out of the industrials sector, reporting Q3 EPS of $1.32, $0.03 higher than the Estimize consensus and an even greater $0.04 above the Wall Street consensus, representing YoY growth of 14%. Revenues were also slightly higher, coming in at $14.29B vs. the Estimize consensus of $14.26B, and growing 6% from Q3 2013. The company saw global shipments rise 6.9% to $1.1B in the third quarter, and international export shipments increased 9.4% with strong growth coming from Asia and Europe. After some mishaps last year, UPS said they are ready for their peak season that comes during the fourth quarter holidays. During Q4 2013, online consumer promotions in the 11th hour caused many packages to be undelivered by the Christmas holiday. In light of that mistake, the company has invested $500k in infrastructure to avoid it from happening again this year. UPS confirmed its full-year outlook, forecasting earnings of $4.90 to $5.00 a share.

Next week will be the heaviest for earnings season thus far, with 615 publicly traded companies and 160 S&P 500 companies reporting. Highly anticipated names include social media darlings, Twitter and Facebook.

How Are We Doing?

Expectations for S&P 500 earnings growth for the third quarter stand at 9.7%. Revenues are anticipated to come in with 4.2% growth. All 10 sectors are anticipated to post positive YoY growth on both the earnings and revenue front.

Leaders

Earnings:

Materials (14.1%). Notable industry: Metals & Mining (27.9%).

Health Care (12.7%). Notable industry: Biotechnology (45.5%)

Energy (11.9%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas & Consumable Fuels (11.8%)

Revenues:

Health Care (9.6%). Notable industry: Biotech (39.8%).

Information Technology (7.2%). Notable industry: Internet Software & Services (15.2%)

Laggards

Earnings:

Utilities (0.8%). Notable industry: Multi­-Utilities (-2.5%).

Telecommunication Services (0.9%): All five companies are within Diversified Telecom Services. Only Verizon posted y­o­y growth.

Revenues:

Energy (0.3%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels (­-0.5%).

Materials (2.9%). Notable industry: Paper & Forest Products (­-10.9%).

Beat/Miss/Match

Earnings: 200 companies have reported thus far, 49% have beaten the Estimize consensus, 38% have missed and 14% have met. This is compared to Wall Street estimates, of which 68% of companies have beat on the bottom­-line, 24% have missed and 9% have met.

Revenue: 50% have beaten the Estimize consensus, 50% have missed, and 0% have met. For revenues, 59% of companies have beat the Wall Street estimate, while 41% have missed.