When the Federal Reserve wraps up its policy meeting Wednesday, one important thing could be missing — a dot.

The central bank’s Federal Open Market Committee is set to release its quarterly update of where individual officials expect interest rates to head this year and through 2028 and beyond. Markets closely parse the grid, known more commonly as the “dot plot,” for information on how Fed officials view the economy and its impact on monetary policy.

However, most Fed-watchers on Wall Street expect new Chair Kevin Warsh won’t participate, either because he feels he’s not ready after having only been in office since May 22 — or simply because he doesn’t like the dot plot and its implications for “forward guidance.”

Declining to submit a dot would counter some 14 years of post-financial crisis practice for the Fed, and risk alienating other FOMC officials who favor the way it helps them communicate with the public. However, it also could be an effective first step for a central bank leader who has vowed fundamental changes for how the institution operates.

“It seems to me fairly likely that he doesn’t want to submit a rate forecast,” said Bill English, former head of monetary affairs at the Fed and now a professor at Yale. “There may be others on the committee who don’t particularly like the dot plot, who might be willing to do that, too.”

Europe’s largest lender, HSBC, reported first-quarter pre-tax profit of $9.4 billion on Tuesday, missing analysts’ estimates on the back of higher expected credit losses and other impairment charges.

HSBC’s revenue gained 6% year-on-year, exceeding estimates, on stronger wealth fees and other income.

Here are HSBC’s first-quarter results compared with the consensus estimates compiled by the bank.

• Pre-tax profit: $9.37 billion vs. $9.59 billion
• Revenue: $18.62 billion vs. $18.49 billion

The lender, whose first-quarter profit before tax fell 1% year-on-year, saw shares in Hong Kong drop 4.6%. Its U.K.-listed shares were last trading 5.5% lower.

Expected credit losses of $1.3 billion were $400 million higher compared with the same period a year earlier — 9% worse than consensus estimates, according to a Citi report.

The credit losses were linked to “fraud-related” exposure to a financial sponsor in the UK and provisions owed to increased uncertainty and a worsening economic outlook due to the conflict in the Middle East, HSBC said in a statement.

“I feel quite comfortable that at a $1.3 billion charge based on what we know today and the forward outlook we have of various downside plausible scenarios, we are well provided for,” HSBC Chief Financial Officer Pam Kaur told CNBC’s “Access Middle East” on Tuesday.

HSBC said in its statement that it was on course to deliver $1.5 billion in annualized cost reduction by the end of June 2026. “Through the privatisation of Hang Seng Bank, we expect to realise $0.5bn in pre-tax revenue and cost synergies across both our brands in Hong Kong by the end of 2028.”

The lender completed the privatization of Hang Seng Bank on Jan. 26, with the latter’s shares subsequently delisted from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. HSBC expects to see some synergy growth to start in the second half of this year, Kaur said in the earnings call.

HSBC’s net interest income rose 8% in the first quarter, year on year, to $8.9 billion, as did operating expenses, also up 8%, owing to the impacts of inflation, forex, higher planned spending and performance-related pay.

The lender highlighted risks due to the Middle East conflict, including higher oil prices, sharper inflation, a significant slowdown in GDP, warning that if those factors came into play there could be a “mid-to-high single digit percentage” negative impact on its profit before tax.

While HSBC maintained its targeted return on tangible equity — a measure of profitability — of 17%, it warned that should the adverse impact from the Middle East crisis materialize, it could bring RoTE, excluding notable items, below 17% in 2026. Annualized RoTE in the reported quarter, excluding items, was 18.7%.

The RoTE forecast does not appear to be a major concern as the bank is already well ahead of the medium-term guidance of over 17%, Citi said.

The HSBC board also approved its first interim dividend for 2026 of 10 cents per share.

Shares of memory companies Micron and Sandisk jumped on Monday, continuing their extended runs, after Melius Research said demand could remain high through the end of the decade.

Memory companies are experiencing major gains from a global shortage for microchips to power artificial intelligence. High Bandwidth Memory, or HBM, is bonded directly to the most advanced graphics processing units from Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices that power nearly all major AI data centers.

Ben Reitzes, an analyst at Melius, upgraded Micron to a buy rating on Monday, noting it could gain another 41% over the next 12 months. The stock is up more than 550% over the past year after gaining 5.6% on Monday.

“The market will eventually be willing to pay more for the unusual durability of the margin and demand profiles that AI makes possible,” Reitzes wrote, adding that he expects Nvidia to invest more in memory soon. “We are only in the early innings of this AI cycle and the need for memory has never been stronger.”

Micron is trading at a record, and it’s market cap is approaching $600 billion.

Sandisk gained 8.1% on Monday and is up over 3,000% in the past year, pushing its market cap past $157 billion. Reitzes predicted the stock will rise another 36% over the next 12 months.

“The numbers speak for themselves,” said Bernstein analyst Mark Newman, who has a buy recommendation on Sandisk. “Earnings revisions are coming up significantly, and that’s powered by very very strong memory prices.”

HBM is made up of stacks of general-purpose memory known as Dynamic Random Access Memory, or DRAM, that enables fast, temporary data storage so the GPU can run parallel tasks.

Micron, Samsung and SK Hynix, the world’s top memory makers, have largely used their DRAM supply to make HBM. The result is a general-purpose memory shortage that’s caused prices to skyrocket. According to data from Counterpoint Research, the DRAM market has recorded 30% quarter-over-quarter growth for two consecutive periods, driven by rising memory prices.

That means consumers are paying more for electronics. Gartner predicts PC prices will rise by 17% this year. The solid-state drives used inside PCs now cost two or three times what they did in December.

Sandisk is a major maker of solid-state drives, which rely on what’s known as NAND memory, a type of flash memory that stores data even when devices are turned off. NAND is experiencing a similar surge in demand as AI servers need increasing amounts of data storage.

Market conditions are pushing memory buyers into longer contracts of three or even five years. SK Hynix and Micron have both said that hyperscalers have been more willing to sign long-term supply agreements in an effort to edge out the competition in securing enough memory. Chip design firm Broadcom, for example, has locked in memory supply through 2028.

“Memory makers also have a willingness to go longer term because they want to get more reliable demand, especially if they’re thinking about adding capacity,” Newman said, adding that it takes about two and a half years to build new factories before production can begin.

Micron is spending $24 billion on a major expansion of its NAND manufacturing facility in Singapore, while also building huge new U.S. chip fabs in New York and Idaho. SK Hynix has broken ground on its first U.S. memory packaging plant in Indiana, and it is expanding production and packaging with new facilities in South Korea.

Sandisk reports quarterly results on Thursday.

Correction: A prior version of this story had an incorrect date for Sandisk earnings.

WATCH: Micron’s massive U.S. expansion

Shares of Nike fell in extended trading Tuesday after the retailer warned sales will fall for the rest of the calendar year, led by an expected 20% decline in its key China market during the current quarter.

Chief Financial Officer Matt Friend said during the company’s earnings call that Nike expects sales for its current fiscal fourth quarter to drop between 2% and 4%, compared with Wall Street estimates of a 1.9% increase, according to LSEG.

For the duration of the calendar year, Friend said, the company expects sales to fall by a low single-digit percentage, led by growth in North America and offset by declines in China. That outlook wasn’t comparable to estimates.

Nike beat expectations across the business on both the top and bottom lines for its fiscal third quarter, but its guidance left investors with more questions about how long its turnaround will take. Friend also cautioned that Nike’s guidance was based off of where the global economic picture stands today — and it could change given recent geopolitical volatility.

“We also recognize that the environment around us has become increasingly dynamic, and we could experience unplanned volatility due to the disruption in the Middle East, rising oil prices and other factors that could impact either input costs or consumer behavior,” said Friend. “We are focused on what we can control.”

Shares fell more than 8% in extended trading.

Here’s how the world’s largest sneaker company did for its fiscal third quarter, compared with estimates from analysts polled by LSEG:

• Earnings per share: 35 cents vs. 28 cents expected
• Revenue: $11.28 billion vs. $11.24 billion expected

The company’s reported net income for the three-month period that ended Feb. 28 was $520 million, or 35 cents per share. That’s a 35% decline from $794 million, or 54 cents per share, a year earlier. That plunge came as Nike’s gross profit margin slid 1.3 percentage points to 40.2%, “primarily due to higher tariffs in North America,” the company said.

Sales were flat at $11.28 billion, compared to $11.27 billion last year.

While Nike beat expectations on the top and bottom lines, it posted a mixed picture regionally. Nike’s largest market of North America continued to show steady growth, as revenue climbed 3% to $5.03 billion, but that was just shy of Wall Street’s expectations of $5.04 billion, according to StreetAccount.

Meanwhile, Nike’s Greater China market continued to shrink, with revenue down 7% to $1.62 billion during the quarter. Still, that total beat analyst estimates of $1.50 billion, according to StreetAccount.

Nike is continuing to work through a colossal turnaround under CEO Elliott Hill. About a year and a half into his tenure, Hill has made strides in repairing parts of the business, but has been clear that it’ll take time for the entire company to improve given the retailer’s scale and complexity. 

He reiterated that expectation on Tuesday, saying in a news release that “the pace of progress is different across the portfolio.”

“The areas we prioritized first continue to drive momentum,” Hill said. “The work is not finished, but the direction is clear, our teams are moving with focus and urgency, and our foundation is getting even stronger to build the future of NIKE.”

Friend said Nike’s turnaround efforts “will continue to impact results over the balance of the calendar year.”

The group’s Frankfurt-listed shares plummeted 8.7% at the open in Europe on Wednesday.

Nike’s recovery was already coming at a tough time as a global trade war dented its efforts to improve profitability and drive sales from inflation-weary shoppers. But now the athletic company will have to contend with a new war in the Middle East that’s already led to rising gas prices and is expected to send consumer prices even higher, which could push shoppers to cut back on nice-to-haves like new clothes and shoes to save money elsewhere. 

“We continue to be encouraged by the momentum in North America. We’ve got a strong order book for summer,” Friend said. “We’re seeing positive signs and sell through. We’re not seeing a consumer reaction to what’s going on in the Middle East at this point in time, in North America.”

Hill has focused in part on revitalizing Nike’s business with wholesale partners as opposed to direct sales on its website and in stores. Wholesale revenue climbed 5% to $6.5 billion.

Meanwhile, direct sales slid 4% to $4.5 billion.