, Columnist
Earnings Party Fades on Stock Market
Investor ebullience diminishes when growth goes from double to single digits.
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Don't expect the first-quarter earnings party to carry over into the second.
After a number of disappointing periods, bottom lines took off in the first three months of the year, up 14 percent on average for companies in the S&P 500. That was the biggest jump since the first quarter of 2011. That led a number of strategists to say the market run that started after Donald Trump was elected president was on solid ground -- justified by bottom lines and not just inflated by the hope of deregulation or tax reform.