Forget Marginal Beats: More Stocks Are Crushing Wall Street Estimates

The second-quarter earnings have been a major source of support for US equities, with profit growth noticeably strong, thanks to a boost from AI investments. But the narrative is becoming less straightforward: investors now have to weigh strong earnings against oil-driven inflation, bond-market pressures, monetary-policy uncertainties, and increasingly demanding expectations for AI-related growth.

The next phase of the earnings story will depend not simply on whether companies continue to...