Geoffrey Smith 

Investing.com — U.S. Retail Sales Data for April and the significance of these data for Federal Reserve Policy are expected to be dominant at least in the morning. Walmart’s earnings and guidance (NYSE:) Home Depot (NYSE:), will shed more light on how strong or weak the U.S. consumers. In an effort to lower the cost of his Twitter acquisition (NYSE:), Elon Musk hid details, causing Twitter stock drop further and Tesla stock (NASDAQ:) to rebound. In Ukraine’s Azovstal steelworks, the defenders laid down their weapons, which ended the longest conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Oil prices reached a seven week high, as investors in Shanghai’s future reopening increased. What you need to know about the financial markets for Tuesday, 17 May.

1. Fed to influence retail sales

Do Americans have a problem with inflation or are they just looking to enjoy life in an economy that doesn’t lock them down? When the U.S. publishes April retail sales figures at 8:30AM ET (1230 GMT), we will all be slightly more informed.

The sales growth is expected to be 0.9%. That would represent their strongest three-month increase. Core sales would have grown 0.4% which would indicate their lowest four month increase.

Any number of interpretations are possible with forecasts like this. Fortunately, there will be a handful of speakers from the Federal Reserve in the course of the day to let us know if the numbers have changed anything (there’s a hint of hope in the air that a bad number will persuade the Fed to ease up on the policy tightening front).

Fed Chair Jerome Powell will headline at 2PM ET. James Bullard, Patrick Harker and Loretta Mester will warm up. Charles Evans and Loretta Mester will host the party.

2. Obmuskation

Elon Musk claimed that his Twitter deal cannot proceed until the company proves its claims about spam and fake users. Parag Agrawal (CEO of Twitter) posted on Monday a lengthy thread explaining the reasons why this deal is not possible.

Musk claimed, via the microblogging site (not via an SEC filing, of course) “20% fake/spam accounts” as a baseline – some four times what Twitter estimates. He added for good measure that the figure “could be *much* higher.”

“My offer was based on Twitter’s SEC filings being accurate. Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO publicly refused to show proof of

This news raised suspicions that Musk might be seeking an excuse to end the deal. The premarket price of Twitter stock fell 2.6%, while Tesla stock rose 3.7%, after it hit a low nine months ago.

3. Shanghai Reopening Hopes: Stocks to Open Higher; Walmart, Home Depot Eyed

U.S. stock prices are expected to rise as global growth fears ease following news from Shanghai that a two month-old lockdown has been lifted.

At 6:15 AM ET they were up 488 points or 1.5% while were up 1.8% (or 2.1%) Since touching an 18 month low last week, the Nasdaq contract gained three out of four days.

Walmart and Home Depot earnings are expected to be released early so the retail sales data at the corporate level will need to be checked against them. Imperial Brands, the company that owns Winston and West cigarettes, saw its sales rise 7.5% to an all-time high of $22 million. This was after it had released its London earnings earlier. Canada Goose, Sea Ltd and AerCap are all contributing numbers (NASDAQ:).

4. The Ukraine Aid Bill progresses after Mariupol defenses surrender

The Russians took control of Mariupol, and the Ukrainian troops that were defending the Azovstal Steelwork in Mariupol gave up their weapons. This comes just a day after Russian forces successfully repelled a counter-attack from Ukraine in the same area.

Recep Tayyip Erdan, the Turkish president, stated that he will oppose NATO membership of Sweden and Finland because they harbor his political enemies. According to Newswires, defense officials expect objections will be remediated.

On Monday the Senate approved the $40 billion U.S. assistance package to Ukraine, passing it 81-11 despite some opposition from Republican Senators. Janet Yellen from the Treasury echoed many of these sentiments by calling on Tuesday for Europe’s increase in aid to Ukraine.

5. Shanghai’s hopes and OPEC+ shortage lead to oil reaching a 7-week record.

Crude oil prices reached a seven week high after Shanghai finished a third consecutive day without discovering any Covid-19 cases in its quarantine zone. This bolstered confidence in Shanghai that it will lift its June lockdown, as indicated by officials.

At 6:30 am ET (1030 GMT), futures had risen 0.6% to $112.54/barrel, and 0.7% at $115.00/barrel by the time of 10:30 GMT.  

Newswire reports that OPEC, its allies and other countries had pumped 2.6 Million barrels per day less in April than was planned were also supportive of prices. This is due to sanctions against the Russian oil sector compounding problems associated with the underinvestment by members of the bloc.

As usual, the American Petroleum Industry will release its weekly inventory figures at 4:30 pm ET.