Every three months, we take a snapshot of the expectations for future earnings in the S&P 500 (Index: SPX) at approximately the midpoint of the current quarter, shortly after most U.S. firms have announced their previous quarter's earnings.
For Fall 2025, our snapshot was taken on 12 November 2025, 91 days after the Summer 2025 snapshot. The outlook for earnings improved since last quarter's snapshot, continuing a positive trend since Spring 2025.
The current projection for the S&P 500's earnings per share through the end of 2025 is $244.51, which would represent a 16.3% year-over-year gain over December 2024's finalized earnings of $210.17.
The following chart, covering how earnings expectations have changed from the end of 2021 through 12 November 2025:
Looking further forward through the end of 2026, Standard & Poor projects the S&P 500's earnings will be $281.78 per share. If this projection holds, it would represent a little over a 15% year-over-year increase over the current earnings projection for 2025.
But will it hold? There's a lot of time between now and the end of December 2026 and if there's one thing the chart makes clear, it's very unlikely the earnings recorded then will match what they were projected to be four quarters earlier!
Reference
Silverblatt, Howard. Standard & Poor. S&P 500 Earnings and Estimates. [Excel Spreadsheet]. 12 November 2025. Accessed 15 November 2025.
Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "A crystal ball with the word 'SP 500' written inside it". And 'Earnings' written above it, which we added.