Home Depot, J.C. Penney, Best Buy headline a big week for retail earnings

With the mixed third-quarter results of retailers from Wal-Mart Stores Inc. WMT -0.04% to Macy’s Inc. M last week, investors are looking for more signals about the state of consumers and merchants’ holiday outlook with this week’s flood of major retail earnings reports from Home Depot Inc. HD +0.48% to Best Buy Co. BBY +1.01%

So far, among 52 of the 120 U.S. retailers it tracked that have reported their results, they exceeded estimates by 0.9% on average, below the long-term-average of a 3% gain, according to Retail Metrics. Overall, retailers’ third-quarter profit is expected to rise an average of 5.1%, above the 3.4% gain of the S&P 500, its data as of Nov. 14 showed.

As a home-builder confidence index disappointed on Monday, coupled with volatile mortgage rates and signs of slowing home sales, investors are eager to hear from Dow component Home Depot, reporting on Tuesday, and its smaller rival Lowe’s Cos. LOW +0.04% , reporting on Wednesday. Both retailers have outpaced the broader industry, having benefited from a resurgent housing market and a pent-up demand that had shifted consumer spending to appliances and home maintenance items from things like apparel. There’s increased debate on how long the pent-up demand will last and also how the Hurricane Sandy that had lifted sales last year would affect sales this year.

Will anyone be taking a Selfie today?

Opening Market Overview

EUR German ZEW Economic Sentiment 54.6 54.6 52.8

EUR ZEW Economic Sentiment 60.2 63.1 59.1

Midday Market Overview

Advert is @13 seconds.

For investors, signs are right for a Santa Claus rally

USD Employment Cost Index q/q 0.4% 0.5% 0.5%

Bennie speaks at midnight our time.

From Marketwatch :- Stock market live blog: Early losses reversed as ECB bond-buying discussed

Evening all, Now shall I stay up for that one? -):

End-of-day Market Overview