There's never a dull week on Wall Street. Let's go over some of the news that will shape the week to come.
Monday
Herbalife (HLF 2.39%) reports quarterly results on Monday afternoon.
Is Herbalife a Ponzi scheme, as Bill Ackman suggests, or is it the growing global nutritional-supplements company that attracted billionaire activist Carl Icahn as a major investor? Icahn's been winning so far if we go by the stock chart.
Analysts see modest earnings growth on an 18% spike in revenue for the quarter.
Tuesday
Three-dimensional printing is all the rage these days, and 3D Systems (DDD 1.01%) has been the promising genre's poster child. The ability to print physical objects isn't fast or cheap, but the same could be said about the original paper printers.
3D Systems reports on Tuesday. Once again, Wall Street's holding out for another period of robust growth. They see revenue soaring 46% for the quarter, with earnings per share climbing from $0.21 to $0.26. Despite 3D Systems' monster return over the past two years, the company has failed to beat analyst profit targets in each of the past three quarters.
Wednesday
The upcoming Twitter IPO is making waves, but could the micro-blogging giant pull this off if not for Facebook's (META -4.90%) bounce back after last year's inauspicious start as a public company? Between the exchange setback and Facebook's lofty initial valuation, the stock fell from its $38 offering price to as low as the teens.
Facebook has bounced back, and a big reason is its success in monetizing mobile. The challenge of making money off smartphone and tablet users will naturally also weigh on Twitter, but we'll get a great snapshot on how things are faring on that front when Facebook reports on Wednesday.
Thursday
Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU) is one of the many companies reporting quarterly results on Thursday. The global maker of networking equipment is starting to show signs of life, and not just because the stock has tripled off its 52-week low.
There may continue to be weakness in its optical and wireless divisions, but its IP business climbed a currency-adjusted 26% in its latest quarter, fueled by strength in its edge routers and carrier Ethernet switches. We'll see on Halloween how well it holds up in its latest quarter.
Friday
The market is typically quiet on Friday, but that won't stop Chevron (CVX 1.46%) from reporting. Wall Street sees the oil and gas giant posting slight declines in revenue and earnings for all of 2013, but those same pros see improvement on both ends of the income statement for the quarter. We'll see how that holds up when Chevron revs up with fresh financials on Friday morning.
