July 2026 opens on a holiday-shortened week and then runs a familiar macro spine into the Fed — but with a twist. The June jobs report is pulled forward to Thursday, July 2, ahead of a bond-market early close that afternoon and a full market close on Friday, July 3 for Independence Day; CPI (July 14), PPI (July 15) and retail sales (July 16) then build toward the July 28–29 FOMC, Chair Kevin Warsh’s second meeting and the first policy decision of the second half — but one that, unlike June, carries no new dot plot. Layered on top is the Q2 earnings wave: the big banks open it mid-month, then a mega-cap cluster — Tesla (July 22), Microsoft and Meta (July 29), Apple and Amazon (July 30) — collides with the Fed decision and the PCE-and-GDP double-header. Below is the calendar we are watching, ordered by U.S. Eastern time, with the timing caveats that matter.
The July calendar
All times are U.S. Eastern (ET). “Before open” and “after close” denote results released outside the regular session. Items whose dates are not yet confirmed — the mega-cap tech reports beyond Tesla and Netflix, and the early-July OPEC+ meeting — are marked accordingly.
| Date (ET) | Event | Category | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wed, Jul 1 · 8:15 AM | ADP June private payrolls | Macro | A payrolls preview two days before the official report — and, in a holiday-shortened week, a potential mover for thin markets. |
| Wed, Jul 1 · 10:00 AM | ISM Manufacturing PMI (June) | Macro | New-orders, employment and prices sub-indices frame the “slowdown vs. sticky-inflation” read; construction spending lands the same morning. |
| Thu, Jul 2 · 8:30 AM | June jobs report (nonfarm payrolls) | Macro | The month’s marquee data — pulled forward from Friday because July 3 is a market holiday, so it hits a thin pre-holiday session. Payrolls, the unemployment rate and average hourly earnings drive the Fed path, yields and the dollar. |
| Thu, Jul 2 · 2:00 PM | Bond market early close (SIFMA); equities trade a full session | Holiday | SIFMA recommends a 2:00 PM ET close for U.S. bond markets ahead of the holiday; equities trade to the bell, but liquidity thins into the long weekend. Tesla is also expected to post Q2 delivery figures around now. |
| Fri, Jul 3 | U.S. markets closed — Independence Day (observed) | Holiday | July 4 falls on a Saturday, so NYSE, Nasdaq and the bond market observe Independence Day on Friday, July 3. Normal trading resumes Monday, July 6. |
| Early Jul · tentative | OPEC+ output decision | Energy | The eight-member OPEC+ group has been setting output month by month; another increase — or a pause — swings oil and, through it, headline inflation. Date not yet confirmed. |
| Mon, Jul 6 · 10:00 AM | ISM Services PMI (June) | Macro | Services prices and employment sub-indices are more inflation-sensitive than the goods side — a key complement to CPI and the Fed path. The July 3 holiday pushes this third-business-day release to Monday. |
| Wed, Jul 8 · 2:00 PM | June FOMC meeting minutes | Policy | The record of Kevin Warsh’s first meeting — how divided the Committee was, and what would move members toward or against a cut — recalibrates expectations into the July 28–29 decision. |
| Wed–Thu, Jul 8–9 | 10- and 30-year Treasury auctions | Rates | Mid-quarter reopenings test long-end demand and term premium; weak auctions can lift long rates and pressure the same high-multiple growth names the AI trade depends on. |
| Tue, Jul 14 · 8:30 AM | June CPI | Macro | The month’s most important inflation print and the last CPI before the July 29 decision — a direct input to the cut debate and to rate-sensitive valuations. |
| Tue, Jul 14 · before open | Q2 bank earnings begin: JPMorgan, Citigroup, Wells Fargo (expected) | Earnings | The unofficial start of earnings season: net interest income, loan-loss and credit trends, and trading/investment-banking fees read the consumer and capital markets. Dates expected, not yet confirmed. |
| Wed, Jul 15 · 8:30 AM | June PPI | Macro | Producer-side inflation; several components feed directly into PCE — the key confirmation after CPI. |
| Wed, Jul 15 · 2:00 PM | Fed Beige Book | Policy | Regional color on growth, hiring and prices, released two Wednesdays before the FOMC — a qualitative check on the hard data. |
| Wed, Jul 15 · before open | Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley (expected) | Earnings | The second wave of big-bank results extends the read on trading, investment banking and consumer credit. Dates expected. |
| Thu, Jul 16 · 8:30 AM | June retail sales | Macro | The key consumer read of the month; hot spending trims cut odds, weak spending revives growth worries. |
| Thu, Jul 16 · after close | Netflix (NFLX) Q2 2026 results | Earnings | First mega-cap platform to report — subscriber growth, the ad tier and margins are a bellwether for streaming and digital advertising. Confirmed for July 16, after the close. |
| Fri, Jul 17 · 10:00 AM | U. Michigan consumer sentiment (preliminary) + inflation expectations | Macro | The Fed watches whether long-run inflation expectations stay anchored; a rise hardens the hawkish case. |
| Fri, Jul 17 | Monthly options expiration | Markets | Standard third-Friday equity and ETF options expiry — lighter than June’s quadruple witching, but still a source of pin risk and late-day volume. |
| Wed, Jul 22 · after close | Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 results | Earnings | First of the late-July mega-cap cluster: deliveries, auto gross margin, energy storage and any robotaxi/AI commentary. Confirmed after the close on July 22. |
| Wed, Jul 22 · expected | Alphabet (GOOGL) Q2 2026 results | Earnings | Search and YouTube trends, Cloud growth and — most watched — AI-capex guidance; Alphabet often reports the same evening as Tesla. Date expected, after close, not yet confirmed. |
| Tue, Jul 28 · 10:00 AM | Conference Board Consumer Confidence (July) | Macro | A timely consumer read as the FOMC convenes; the expectations gap and the “jobs hard to get” reading feed the soft-landing debate. |
| Tue–Wed, Jul 28–29 | FOMC meeting | Policy | The month’s biggest macro event and the first policy decision of the second half — Chair Kevin Warsh’s second meeting. |
| Wed, Jul 29 · 2:00 PM | FOMC rate decision + Chair Warsh press conference (2:30 PM) | Policy | Crucially, no new Summary of Economic Projections or dot plot at this meeting (the next is September), so the statement wording and the Chair’s tone carry the full signal on the path from here. |
| Wed, Jul 29 · after close | Microsoft (MSFT) & Meta (META) Q2 results (expected) | Earnings | Azure and cloud growth and Meta’s ad trends matter, but the tape is watching AI-capex guidance most — and these land hours after the Fed decision. Dates expected. |
| Thu, Jul 30 · 8:30 AM | June PCE + personal income/spending; advance Q2 GDP | Macro | PCE is the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, released the morning after the decision; the same-day advance Q2 GDP frames second-half growth. Both confirmed for July 30. |
| Thu, Jul 30 · after close | Apple (AAPL) & Amazon (AMZN) Q2 results (expected) | Earnings | iPhone and Services growth, AWS re-acceleration and 2026 capex plans close out the mega-cap week. Dates expected; Apple reports fiscal Q3. |
| Fri, Jul 31 · 8:30 AM | Q2 Employment Cost Index (ECI) | Macro | The Fed’s cleanest wage-inflation gauge — a hot Q2 ECI complicates the easing case just as the month ends. |
| Fri, Jul 31 · 10:00 AM | U. Michigan consumer sentiment (final) | Macro | Revises the July 17 preliminary read; watch whether inflation expectations are marked up. |
Three threads run through July
1 — The data spine into a no-dot-plot Fed
The macro calendar runs a familiar spine, and it all funnels into the July 29 decision — but with one important difference from June. The month opens on a compressed, holiday-shortened week: ADP and ISM manufacturing on July 1, then the June jobs report pulled forward to Thursday, July 2 ahead of the Friday, July 3 close. From there, CPI (July 14), PPI (July 15) and retail sales (July 16) set the inflation-and-consumer backdrop, and the Employment Cost Index (July 31) closes the month with the Fed’s cleanest wage read. The July 28–29 FOMC is Chair Kevin Warsh’s second meeting and the first policy decision of the second half — but unlike June, it carries no new Summary of Economic Projections or dot plot. With no fresh projections to anchor the debate, the statement language and Warsh’s press-conference tone will do all the talking, and PCE plus advance Q2 GDP the very next morning (July 30) will test whatever message the Fed sends.
2 — The Q2 earnings wave: banks, then Big-Tech AI capex
July is when Q2 earnings season arrives in force. The big banks open it around July 14–15 — JPMorgan, Citigroup and Wells Fargo first, then Goldman Sachs, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley — with net interest income, credit trends and trading/IB fees reading the consumer and capital markets. Netflix (July 16) starts the platform reports, but the main event is a mega-cap cluster stacked into the back half: Tesla (July 22, confirmed) and, expected alongside, Alphabet; then Microsoft and Meta on July 29 — the very evening of the Fed decision — and Apple and Amazon on July 30, the morning of PCE and GDP. Across all of them the market cares less about the printed quarter than about AI-capex guidance: whether hyperscaler spending is still accelerating. The dates for the mega-caps beyond Tesla and Netflix are expected, not yet confirmed.
3 — A holiday-shortened, thinner-liquidity open
July’s market plumbing is quieter than June’s — no quadruple witching, no Russell reconstitution — but the calendar’s shape still matters. The first week is holiday-shortened: the bond market closes early on July 2 (SIFMA), U.S. markets are shut July 3, and the June jobs report lands in that thin pre-holiday session, where reactions can be outsized. Monthly options expiration on July 17 is the lone structural date, lighter than a quad-witching but still a source of pin risk. And an early-July OPEC+ decision is the wildcard for oil — and, through it, the inflation prints the Fed is watching.
What we’re watching
The pivot of the month is the July 29 FOMC — and the fact that it comes without a new dot plot. In June, the Summary of Economic Projections framed the second-half debate; in July, with no fresh projections, the market must read Chair Warsh’s reaction function from the statement and the press conference alone. The run-in — the July 2 jobs report, CPI on July 14, PPI and retail sales the same week — will either widen or narrow the path to easing, and PCE plus advance Q2 GDP the morning after (July 30) will immediately test the message. The quiet tell remains the long end: if the 10- and 30-year auctions draw soft demand, higher term premium pressures exactly the high-multiple names the AI trade leans on.
Underneath the macro sits the Q2 earnings wave, and its timing is the story. Microsoft and Meta report the evening of the Fed decision; Apple and Amazon the morning PCE and GDP hit — a roughly 48-hour window that will set the tone for the second half. The banks (July 14–15) read the real economy; the mega-caps read whether AI capex is still accelerating or merely holding. With a holiday-thinned open, a no-dot-plot Fed and the heaviest earnings of the quarter stacked into the last week, July rewards a process that separates signal from positioning noise — which is exactly what our systematic models are built to do.