The Week Ahead: What Is the Fed's Next Move?

The Federal Reserve's Federal Open Market Committee will meet on Tuesday and Wednesday. Some analysts and economists believe that May's consumer price index, which revealed a slight year-over-year decline in inflation, has set the stage for an interest-rate cut. However, it's also believed that any explicit announcement about rate changes will be delayed until after the June 28-29 G-20 summit in Japan, where President Donald Trump will likely meet with China's President Xi Jinping. Ongoing trade tensions with both China and Mexico (and presidential tweets about tariffs) have contributed to the market volatility seen over the past two months.

As for quarterly earnings releases, it will be another relatively quiet week. Wide-moat Oracle ORCL will report its fourth-quarter earnings on Wednesday. After Oracle's third-quarter results were released in March, Morningstar analyst John Barrett noted that the sustained revenue growth in the company's cloud services and license support division (accounting for 69% of the firm's revenue in the quarter) was helping to offset revenue declines in other divisions and was indicative of the switching costs that current Oracle customers face.

Also reporting earnings next week are CarMax KMX, Darden Restaurants DRI (the parent company of Olive Garden and other restaurant chains), and Kroger KR.