S&P 500 earnings now expected to show growth for third quarter

S&P 500 earnings are now expected have increased slightly in the third quarter, reversing forecasts for another quarter of profit declines, Thomson Reuters data shows.

The improvement in earnings projections follows mostly stronger-than-expected results from banks and other companies. Results are in from 52 companies so far.

Earnings are projected to have increased 0.2 percent in the quarter. That would be up from a decline of 0.5 percent forecast two weeks ago, the data shows.

(Reporting by Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)