U.S. companies could plow more of the money saved from sweeping tax cuts into business investment later this year, perhaps even surpassing a jump in first-quarter capital expenditure that was the highest in almost seven years, strategists and analysts said.
Higher spending on technology, equipment and facilities could ease worries that S&P 500 companies have reached a peak in the profit growth investors are counting on to extend the nine-year bull market in equities.
The increased spending in the first quarter follows significant cuts in corporate taxes approved late last year by the Republican-led Congress. Companies have also been returning the tax cut windfall to shareholders via share buybacks and increased dividends at amounts never seen before, highlighted by Apple’s $23.5 billion repurchase in the first quarter.
With data in from 94 percent of S&P 500 companies, first-quarter capital expenditures total $159 billion, up more than 21 percent from a year ago and on track to be the highest year-over-year growth since the third quarter of 2011, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices data.
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