Trending U.S. stock market, business and economy stories

Kane Jaklitsch, Staff Writer

Home owners in California who want to insure their homes for future wildfires are paying a price for two years of record breaking numbers.

California has always been prone to wildfires, but insurers say the risk is increasing as fire-prone areas have become increasingly populated and global warming adds uncertainty to the natural outbreaks. State wildfires in 2017 and 2018 cost insurers more than $23 billion, according to the California Department of Insurance.

Home insurance companies in the state are canceling some policies, refusing to sell new ones in certain areas and applying for rate increases as they look to reduce their risk for future wildfires.

Insurance companies including State Farm and Allstate have filed to raise home-insurance rates in the past six months. The California FAIR Plan, the state insurer of last resort, said it would implement an average 20.3 percent price increase in April, with the largest increases for policies in wildfire-prone areas.

Another major storyline in the markets recently is BB&T’s acquisition of SunTrust banks for $28.2 billion.

The two combined to create the sixth-largest U.S. retail bank and end a decade-long big bank merger drought.

Since the 2008 financial crisis, there have been stricter regulations on banks, whichcaused an absence of deals. However, bank rules have loosened considerably following President Trump’s 2016 election, resulting in this deal along with an optimistic look for the future.

Technical signals are pointing to a healthy stock market resulting from cautious rate increases from the Federal Reserve and continuing confidence in the economy.

A number of technical signals used by analysts to gauge the health of the stock market have turned investors bullish. Major U.S. indexes have crossed or are nearing their 200-day moving averages, and the number of stocks setting 52-week highs is on the rise.

Fourth-quarter earnings season starts to wind down this week, with 61 S&P 500 companies releasing results for their last period of 2018.

Hotel chain Loews kicks off the week on Monday, then Shopify is scheduled to release their earnings on Tuesday.

Analysts expect the company to report earnings of $0.06 per share for the quarter. Insurance giant American International Group and networking equipment maker Cisco will be the focus on Wednesday, followed by a busy Thursday with The Coca-Cola Co., utility Duke Energy, media company CBS and semiconductor companies Nvidia and Applied Materials reporting their earnings.

In the week ahead, the U.S. will see data on inflation, retail sales, industrial output and sentiment.

On Wednesday, The U.S. Labor Department publishes the latest inflation data.

Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal expect inflation to have pulled back on an annual basis.

On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Commerce releases December retail-sales numbers, a month later than expected due to the partial government shutdown.

Economists predict that retail-sale growth decelerated in December.

Friday, The Federal Reserve publishes industrial-output data. Economists expect output to have grown in January, but at a weaker pace than in December.