Private astronauts in space and Nvidia reports Q2 earnings

Hello and welcome to the working week.

One event worth keeping an eye on is set to happen high above our heads on Tuesday when the Polaris Dawn space mission is set to launch with billionaire Jared Isaacman and three others on board. The mission, privately funded by Isaacman and operated by SpaceX, is using the company’s Falcon 9 rocket and spacesuits.

The spacecraft’s crew are planning to attempt a spacewalk during their mission, which is predicted to last five days. If they pull it off, the crew will be the first non-government astronauts to complete a spacewalk. While mainly symbolic, the feat would be a sign of the increase in private companies that are making more ambitious plans for space.

Already this year we have had the first commercial space flight to successfully land on the moon. Elon Musk’s SpaceX is also an integral part of Nasa’s Artemis programme to return to moon as the global space race gathers pace.

Back on solid ground, there are some headline acts to watch out for in this week’s company results, including chipmaker Nvidia reporting its second-quarter results on Wednesday. In the group’s first-quarter results it reported a staggering 262 per cent increase in revenue. At the time the company’s boss Jensen Huang told investors that Nvidia would see “a lot” of revenue from its new Blackwell chips that power generative AI models that the company unveiled in June.

Since then the chipmaker has become the world’s most valuable company, lost about $750bn in value, and then gained it all back. No matter what happens, Nvidia’s results will be one to watch. It will also be worth catching the results for CrowdStrike, the first since a software update by the cyber security group caused an outage for large companies including Delta. This will be the first chance for investors to see in detail how the outage affected the company’s bottom line.

One more thing . . . 

In the UK it has been a surprisingly pleasant summer with only a few dull days. But as August winds down this week, our weather is set to take a turn from better to wetter. The UK Met office is aware of this and on Thursday will announce storm names for 2024-25. Names can be suggested by the public but cannot start with the letters Q, U, X, Y and Z so that they are aligned with the US National Hurricane Center naming conventions. So, sadly, we will never see a storm Zane.

Key economic and company reports

Here is a more complete list of what to expect in terms of company reports and economic data this week.

Monday

• Sweden: The central bank publishes the minutes from its monetary policy meeting

• UK: summer bank holiday. Markets closed (not Scotland)

• Philippines: National Heroes Day holiday. Financial markets closed

• Spain: PPI for July

Tuesday

• Hungary: Central bank interest rate decision

• UK: British Retail Consortium Shop Price Index, giving a picture of the inflation rate of 500 of the most commonly bought high street products for August

• UK: Britvic shareholders vote on acquisition by Carlsberg

• Results: BHP FY preliminary, Bank of Nova Scotia Q3

Wednesday

• Israel interest rate announcement

• UK: Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee member Catherine Mann participates in the Central Bank Research Association annual meeting in Frankfurt

• UK: Q2 GDP estimate for Scotland

• Results: Bath & Body Works Q2, Prudential HY, Lego interim results, Nvidia Q2, Woolworths FY 2024, Royal Bank of Canada Q3, HP Q3, CrowdStrike Q2, Salesforce Q2

Thursday

• UK: Resolution Foundation annual Living Standards Audit

• US: Revised growth figures for Q2 2024

• Sweden: Q2 GDP data

• Results: Qantas FY preliminary results, Autodesk Q2, Gap Q2, Best Buy Q2, Dollar General Q2

Friday

• India: GDP for Q1

• Peru: Santa Rosa of Lima Day. Financial markets closed

• Czech GDP Q2

• Turkey: Victory Day. Financial markets closed

• Kazakhstan: Constitution Day. Financial markets closed

World events

Finally, here is a rundown of other events and milestones this week.

Monday

Tuesday

• US: Scheduled launch of Polaris Dawn mission from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on board a Falcon 9 rocket

• US: Two-day Intelligence and National Security Summit is held just outside Washington DC. Speakers include FBI deputy director Paul Abbate and the CIA deputy director David S Cohen

Wednesday

Thursday

• UK: The Met Office announces its names for storms for the 2024-25 season

• 75th anniversary of the Soviet Union testing it first atomic bomb. The same day is also the international day against nuclear tests

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

• Azerbaijan parliamentary elections

• Germany: Parliamentary elections in Saxony and Thüringen state

• First day of autumn by the UK Met meteorological calendar