CHRIS VERSACE: Good morning, Action Alerts Plus members. And welcome to Tuesday, the seventh day of trading for October. Despite the weekend attacks on Israel, equity markets rebounded and finished higher yesterday following more dovish comments from Fed officials.
Now, it is a big week for the Fed heads, as I like to call them. And we have several more on tap today. While we could get some mixed signals, our take is, given the timing of the September PPI and CPI data out tomorrow and Thursday morning, we'll be far more interested in Fed official comments once the data has been released and we've had a chance to dig into it.
In terms of Israel, we very much see this as a developing situation, and one that in the near term will influence the market as well as oil and gold prices. We are also hearing Israeli forces are stretched for equipment. And this means keeping an eye on Washington for military aid. We continue to read that there could be a tie up for that aid with incremental aid as well for Ukraine. Either way, more aid to Israel, or Israel and Ukraine, would be a positive for our shares of Lockheed Martin.
And this morning, we also heard from PepsiCo. The company delivered a beat and raised September quarter, shrugging off recent concerns about weight loss drugs that hit the shares last week. In addition to lifting its EPS target for this year, Pepsi also offered initial 2024 guidance with revenue and EPS at the upper end of its respective long-term targets.
We'll have more after the company's earnings conference call this morning. But with the shares below the portfolio's average cost basis, it's a good pickup for members. That'll do it for today's Rundown. JD and I will be back tomorrow to answer some of your biggest questions of the week.