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Max Knoblauch2h

Delta reports better-than-expected Q1 earnings, surges as oil plummets

Delta Air Lines reported its first-quarter results before markets opened on Wednesday. The carrier’s shares surged 12% in premarket trading.

Delta, which as of today will charge passengers $10 more per checked bag, reported:

Adjusted earnings of $0.64 per share, compared to the $0.58 per share expected by analysts polled by FactSet.
Adjusted operating revenue of $14.2 billion, compared to estimates of $14 billion.

Looking ahead, Delta said it expects Q2 earnings per share of between $1 and $1.50, below Wall Street estimates of $1.56 per share — which might be enough to disappoint investors if oil, one of the largest inputs for an airline’s fuel cost base, wasn’t tanking. Indeed, West Texas Intermediate crude futures are down more than 16% on Wednesday morning, following President Trump’s comments that he agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday evening. Delta did not give any full-year earnings guidance in its press release.

Like other carriers, Delta has taken a hit in recent weeks as oil — and jet fuel — prices spike amid the war in Iran. Significant delays, cancellations, and rebookings have also battered US airlines.

Delta, which is becoming an increasingly K-shaped airline, saw premium tickets grow 14% year over year in the first quarter, compared to 1% growth in main cabin tickets.

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Everything has a reason to go up now that oil’s down*

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Matt Phillips10m

Data center trade revived on Iran war cease fire

Data center stocks leapt early Wednesday, as the Iran war cease fire reinvigorated risk-taking aimed at the booming AI buildout.

A wide range of stocks related to building and powering data center shells, filling them with chips, servers, racks, and memory and then connecting those racks to one another and users around the world bounced hard in early trading.

Memory stocks like Micron, Western Digital, Seagate Technology Holdings, and Sandisk — favorites of retail traders given their massive performance in recent years — climbed.

Traders seemed to price in durable demand for memory and other chips, with the companies that make the machines that actually make semiconductors rising sharply as well. Dutch semiconductor machinery giant ASML rose, as did Applied Materials, Lam Research and KLA Corp.

Fiber optic cable and connecting companies like Lumentum, Coherent, Corning and Applied Optoelectronics — which had been on a run before the outbreak of Mideast hostilities — regained momentum.

And the construction and engineering companies — MasTec, Vertiv Holdings, Quanta Services, Comfort Systems USA — that have been feasting on the cash pouring into data center building and engineering also jumped.

Max Knoblauch1h

Airlines and cruise stocks spike after oil plunges on 2-week ceasefire with Iran

Travel stocks are surging Wednesday following President Trump’s announcement on Tuesday evening of a two-week ceasefire with Iran.

West Texas Intermediate crude futures were down about 16% as of 7 a.m. ET. Airlines, which have been pounded by higher jet fuel costs for more than a month now, moved in the opposite direction. Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, and American Airlines were up more than 10% in premarket trading. Southwest Airlines and JetBlue also rose by high single digits. Three major US airlines (JetBlue, United, and Delta) raised baggage fees in recent days as fuel costs climbed.

Cruise stocks also rallied, with Carnival, Norwegian Cruise Line, and Royal Caribbean all up more than 7%.

markets

J. Edward Moreno3h

Levi Strauss jumps after raising full-year guidance, reporting earnings beat

Levi Strauss rose more than 11% in premarket trading Wednesday after it beat earnings expectations and raised its full-year guidance.

For its fiscal year 2026, which ends December 1, the apparel giant now expects to report:

Revenue growth between 5.5% and 6.5%, up from 5% to 6%. Analysts polled by FactSet are penciling in about 6.21% sales growth.
Adjusted earnings per share between $1.42 and $1.48, up from $1.40 to $1.46 but still a hair below the $1.49 Wall Street is expecting.

The company also beat expectations for its first quarter, which ended March 1. It reported:

Quarterly adjusted earnings per share of $0.42, versus the $0.37 expected.
Revenue of $1.74 billion, more than 5% ahead of the $1.65 billion that was expected, with direct-to-consumer sales making up the majority of its revenue stream for the quarter.

The stock is up nearly 11% as of 6:35 a.m. ET, having shed roughly ~5% from the start of the year to yesterday’s close.

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Oil plummets on 2-week ceasefire announcement, dragging energy stocks lower

Oil prices are sharply lower Wednesday morning, extending their biggest single-day drop in six years after President Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran that includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of global oil supply flows.

As of 5:10 a.m. ET, international benchmark Brent crude was down 13.6% at around $94 per barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate crude fell ~16% to $95 per barrel — following its steepest one-day decline since the Russia-Saudi price war in March 2020 and extending the overnight sell-off.

A slew of energy stocks are also giving back some of their war-driven gains, with oil and gas producers including Occidental Petroleum, Devon Energy, Diamondback Energy, ConocoPhillips, APA Corporation, Coterra Energy, and EOG Resources all down 6% to 9% in premarket trading.

Oil majors Exxon and Chevron both fell more than 5%, while fuel refiners including Marathon Petroleum, Valero, and Phillips 66 moved 4% to 6% lower.

Oil field services names like Halliburton and natural gas producer EQT Corp fell 4% to 5%, while chemical makers Dow, Inc. and LyondellBasell, along with fertilizer company CF Industries, are also trading lower. Natural gas exporter Cheniere Energy was deeply in the red as well.

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