Lewis Krauskopf, David Randall

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A mixed bag of earnings from some of Wall Street’s biggest companies may muddy the outlook for investors hoping to “buy the dip” amid a vicious stock market selloff.

Google parent Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:) Inc posted first-quarter revenues below analysts’ expectations. The software giant, however, had a huge week of results. Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:) For its next fiscal year, the company expects double-digit revenue growth.

Investors have focused on results from some of Wall Street’s biggest names this week, hoping they could provide a counterweight to the deluge of news that has battered stocks in recent days, highlighted by concerns over an increasingly hawkish Federal Reserve to worries over geopolitical turbulence stemming from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Though most of the earnings season lies ahead, some investors worry that anything less than stellar results from corporate behemoths will do little to stem a slide in stocks that left the down 12.4% on the year after Tuesday’s 2.8% drop. On Tuesday, the Nasdaq closed at its lowest level since December 2020. It lost almost 4%. This puts it 22 percent below its all-time peak of Nov. 19, 2018.

Thomas Hayes is chairman of Great Hill Capital New York. He stated, “There’s lots of anxiety ahead for the earnings… because if the don’t keep up, then it’s no longer possible to maintain the market.”

Despite the mixed results from big growth names, earnings in the broad S&P 500 have topped analyst expectations. According to data from Refinitiv, 81% have outperformed analyst expectations. First-quarter profits are now projected to be up 8.2% over the previous year, compared to 6.4% in April.

There have also been high profile disappointments like Netflix (NASDAQ:), which was once a leading growth stock. Its shares were wiped out following its disappointing results.

“Expectations for growth (companies) are very, very high, and you don’t meet expectations and you are going to see the Netflix or the Google drops,” said Paul Nolte, portfolio manager at Kingsview Investment Management in Chicago. “It’s not industry specific, it’s more company specific.”

Microsoft’s shares were higher in after-hours trading on Tuesday, while Alphabet’s declined.

Tesla (NASDAQ:), shares fell 12% Tuesday following Elon Musk’s announcement that he would buy Twitter (NYSE) for $44 Billion.

However, Visa (NYSE) shares gained on Tuesday as the payments company stated it expects its revenue to increase past pre-pandemic levels. The markets may get a boost from other results, such as those coming in this week from Amazon.com (NASDAQ.com:) or Apple (NASDAQ.com:), and Meta Platforms (NASDAQ.:). With only a few days left in the month, the S&P 500 is down 7.8% for April so far, which would be its biggest monthly percentage drop since March 2020.

April’s closing days might offer hope, however. According to Bespoke Investment Group, in 39 prior months since 1980 where the S&P 500 was down at least 5% with three trading days left, the S&P averaged a gain of 1.51% in the final three trading days of these months. Bespoke wrote in a note, “Usually the final three trading day of these poor months offer some relief to investors.”