FactSet Put Blended Second-Quarter Growth at 50.4%. Excluding Alphabet and Amazon, It Was 32.0%.

by Grace Whitaker · August 28, 2026

Earnings Editor, Earnings Dispatch

The most useful number in FactSet's second-quarter earnings scorecard is the one it prints next to the headline. In the S&P 500 Earnings Season Update dated August 7, 2026, written by John Butters, the firm put the blended year-over-year earnings growth rate for the index's second quarter at 50.4 percent. In the same document it put the figure excluding Alphabet and Amazon at 32.0 percent. Two companies account for the 18.4-percentage-point difference.

Blended, in FactSet's usage, means actual results for companies that have reported combined with estimates for those that have not. As of that August 7 update, the firm said 88 percent of S&P 500 companies had reported actual results. The figures below are all as of that date; it is the most recent weekly update surfaced in reporting this article, and the season has continued since.

The surprise number has the same problem

FactSet reported that companies in aggregate beat earnings estimates by 29.2 percent -- against a five-year average of 7.0 percent and a ten-year average of 7.4 percent. Excluding Alphabet and Amazon, the same aggregate surprise was 10.9 percent. That is still well above both long-run averages, but it is a different order of magnitude from 29.2 percent, and it is the second time the same two names carry the headline.

The breadth figures do not depend on those two companies in the same way, and they are the sturdier part of the scorecard. FactSet said 86 percent of reporting companies had beaten EPS estimates, against a five-year average of 78 percent and a ten-year average of 76 percent. On revenue, 76 percent had beaten, against averages of 70 and 68 percent. The aggregate revenue surprise was 3.2 percent, against 1.9 and 1.6 percent.

Revenue growth is the line that moved least dramatically and perhaps says the most. Blended second-quarter revenue growth stood at 15.0 percent as of August 7, up from 12.2 percent at the end of the quarter on June 30. Earnings growth over the same stretch went from 23.1 percent at quarter-end to 50.4 percent. Sales roughly held their shape as the results came in; profits did not.

By sector, FactSet reported that energy, communication services, consumer discretionary, information technology and materials led with double-digit earnings growth, and that health care was the only sector reporting a year-over-year decline. All eleven sectors were reporting year-over-year revenue growth.

For what comes next, the same update carried estimated earnings growth of 27.4 percent for the third quarter of 2026, 25.2 percent for the fourth, and 30.0 percent for the full year. The forward twelve-month price-to-earnings ratio for the index stood at 20.0, against a five-year average of 19.9 and a ten-year average of 19.0.

The tail of the season is on a different calendar

The companies filing this week are not in the calendar-quarter cohort at all. Marvell Technology, which reported Thursday after the close, closed a fiscal second quarter on August 1, 2026. Autodesk, reporting the same afternoon, closed its fiscal second quarter on July 31, 2026. Ulta Beauty, also Thursday, closed a fiscal second quarter on August 1, 2026. All three periods ended a month or more after the June 30 date that anchors the calendar second quarter, and each company's fiscal year is offset from the calendar one.

That misalignment is worth holding onto when a late-August result is read against a season-wide growth figure. The two are not measuring the same twelve weeks.

Three reports, three different reporting vocabularies

The same Thursday evening also produced a clean illustration of how far the definition of earnings can stretch inside one night's filings. Ulta Beauty's release, filed as Exhibit 99.1 to a Form 8-K, presents no non-GAAP measures at all: net sales of $3,035.7 million, up 8.9 percent, comparable sales up 3.8 percent, net income of $282.0 million and GAAP diluted EPS of $6.55, up 13.3 percent, on 43.062 million diluted shares. There is no adjusted figure to compare it to because the company did not publish one.

Marvell published both, and they are far apart: GAAP diluted EPS of $0.33 against non-GAAP diluted EPS of $0.94, the statutory figure roughly 35 percent of the adjusted one, with $594.6 million of what the release calls pre-tax special items and $36.7 million of other income tax effects itemised in between. Autodesk published both and they are closer: GAAP diluted EPS of $2.33 against non-GAAP diluted EPS of $3.30, about 71 percent.

Ulta also raised its full-year fiscal 2026 outlook and, unusually for a raise, narrowed it. The company moved its diluted EPS guidance to $28.70-$29.00 from a prior $28.36-$28.80, lifting the midpoint from $28.58 to $28.85 -- 27 cents -- while cutting the width of the band from 44 cents to 30. It raised net sales growth guidance to 6.7-7.2 percent from 6-7 percent, comparable sales to 3.2-3.7 percent from 2.5-3.5 percent, and operating income growth to 8.3-9.3 percent from 6.5-9 percent. Chief executive Kecia Steelman said in the release that the team had delivered another quarter of strong sales, profit and earnings growth, and that the company had raised its guidance on the back of a strong first half, reflecting confidence in its strategic priorities. The release says Ulta repurchased 1.4 million shares for $791.1 million, excluding excise taxes, in the first six months of fiscal 2026, and that $1.0 billion remained available as of August 1, 2026 under a $3.0 billion programme announced in October 2024. It ended the quarter with 1,622 stores.

The last completed session, Thursday, August 27, closed higher across the board. The Associated Press recorded the S&P 500 at 7,730.99, up 55.29 points or 0.7 percent; the Dow Jones Industrial Average at 53,569.44, up 105.56 points or 0.2 percent; the Nasdaq composite at 26,541.35, up 411.16 points or 1.6 percent; and the Russell 2000 at 3,014.34, up 8.44 points or 0.3 percent. On a year-to-date basis the AP put the S&P 500 up 12.9 percent, the Dow up 11.5 percent, the Nasdaq up 14.2 percent and the Russell 2000 up 21.5 percent. Friday's session is still open and this article carries no closing figure for it.