5 things to know before the stock market opens Thursday

Federal Reserve officials see another rate hike before the end of the year, according to minutes from their September meeting released yesterday. However, the document didn’t give any clear hints as to when exactly policymakers thought that hike could come.

Here’s what else we’re following:

PepsiCo beat Wall Street’s third-quarter expectations on both lines this morning, reporting a 5.6% jump in net sales as international markets continued to drive the beverage giant’s growth.

As CNBC’s Amelia Lucas writes, 41% of Pepsi’s net revenue so far this year is thanks to its international business. Its North America beverage division, on the other hand, continues to shrink as Pepsi pursues a domestic turnaround focused on ingredient innovation and advertising.

Those home-court struggles are weighing on profits, leading Pepsi to slash its full-year earnings forecast with one quarter to go. PepsiCo CEO Ramon Laguarta will join CNBC at 10 a.m. ET for an exclusive interview. Click here to watch live.

Crude oil prices are up more than 4% this morning after Trump said he no longer wants a deal with Iran. “I think the deal isn’t really something that I want to do, but they’re willing to offer us anything to stop,” the president said at a Wednesday night campaign rally in Texas.

Trump’s comments come after NBC News reported that he and his team have discussed potentially resuming military operations soon. Brent crude futures and U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures are both higher this morning on fears that hostilities in the Middle East may escalate once again.

In an effort to ease the pain of record-high diesel prices, Trump signed an executive order earlier this week allowing truckers to use off-road diesel on highways without paying federal excise taxes. But analysts said that the order may only end up deferring those payments rather than removing them entirely.

Microsoft’s new laptop will come with an Nvidia chip and $2,599 price tag, the companies announced yesterday. Consumers can preorder the Surface Laptop Ultra now, and it will begin shipping next week.

As CNBC’s Jordan Novet writes, Microsoft has been trying to pack more artificial intelligence capabilities into its consumer devices. Microsoft also said yesterday that Meta would roll out a version of its Muse AI agent for Windows.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang are both among the slate of tech execs expected to be honored by Trump with medals today, CNBC confirmed. Tesla‘s Elon Musk and Dell‘s Michael Dell are also on the list for the event titled Science: A New Golden Age Summit.

Megadonors are broadly backing Republicans this midterm election cycle, according to a CNBC analysis of Federal Election Commission records. Out of the 20 largest donors and donor groups, 14 are either exclusively or almost entirely backing GOP candidates or aligned groups.

Democratic donors, meanwhile, have increasingly skipped over the Democratic National Committee, with some choosing to instead funnel money directly to candidates. Fundraisers told CNBC’s Luke Fountain that Democratic donors have “trauma” from the last election cycle, as well as concerns about the DNC’s leadership and the growing influence of the party’s democratic socialist bloc.

Between Labor Day and Sept. 25, conservative super PACs outspent Democratic counterparts by an almost 2-to-1 ratio, the FEC records show. The GOP is working — and spending — hard in hopes of keeping control of Washington, as once-safe districts are now seen as toss-ups.

Buckle up: Wall Street is expecting another gangbusters earnings season. Here’s how analysts’ expectations for third-quarter earnings growth have changed since the end of June:

— CNBC’s Jeff Cox, Jessica Dickler, Laya Neelakandan, Sean Conlon, Amelia Lucas, Anniek Bao, Spencer Kimball, Jordan Novet, Lora Kolodny, Luke Fountain and Daren Fonda contributed to this report.

Caleigh Keating assisted in the production of this newsletter. Josephine Rozzelle edited this edition.