US STOCKS-Wall Street treads water as earnings wave nears

* Investors await reports from Alphabet, Microsoft after the
bell
* Tesla slips, weighs most on S&P 500 and Nasdaq
* 3M slides on warning of higher costs
* UPS jumps as revenue tops expectations
* Indexes: Dow -0.01%, S&P 500 -0.02%, Nasdaq -0.31%

(Updates with afternoon trading)
By Noel Randewich and Shreyashi Sanyal
April 27 (Reuters) - Tepid results from Tesla and 3M weighed
on Wall Street on Tuesday as investors focused on an approaching
wave of earnings reports from Microsoft, Alphabet and other
corporate heavyweights.
Electric-car maker Tesla Inc TSLA.O dropped 3% after its
quarterly results late on Monday fell short of some investors'
expectations, with its revenue beat largely supported by sales
of environmental credits and selling bitcoin, rather than
vehicle sales.
Microsoft Corp MSFT.O and Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O slipped
ahead of their quarterly reports after the bell. Shares of Apple
Inc AAPL.O , Facebook Inc FB.O and Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O ,
slated to report later this week, were mixed.
Shares of 3M Co MMM.N fell 2.7% after the conglomerate
said supply chain disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic and the
February winter storm were pushing up its costs. First-quarter overall earnings per share for S&P 500
companies are expected to jump 35% from a year earlier,
according to Refinitiv IBES data.
The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq ended at record levels on Monday,
and have mainly been supported by ebbing inflation worries,
improving economic data, swift vaccine distribution and
unprecedented monetary and fiscal measures.
"We are in that spot where the economy is recovering, there
is stimulus money to be spent and people have increased their
desire and propensity to consume. For the remainder of the year,
you're going to see some fairly optimistic thoughts," said Tom
Martin, senior portfolio manager at Globalt Investments in
Atlanta.
Investors will monitor the Federal Reserve's two-day meeting
for cues on the central bank's thinking on inflation, bond
buying and risks to the financial system posed by soaring asset
prices. The Fed is not expected to change its policy guidance at
the end of the meeting on Wednesday. In the latest upbeat economic data, U.S. consumer confidence
jumped to a 14-month high in April as more services businesses
reopened on increased vaccinations and additional fiscal
stimulus. In afternoon trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
.DJI was down 0.01% at 33,979.71 points, while the S&P 500
.SPX lost 0.02% to 4,186.61.
The Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped -0.31% to 14,094.32.
Also expected to report after the bell on Tuesday were
companies including Visa V.N , Texas Instruments TXN.O , Amgen
AMGN.O and Starbucks SBUX.O .
United Parcel Service Inc UPS.N jumped 11% after it topped
estimates for quarterly revenue. General Electric GE.N fell 2.2% after it disappointed
investors who were expecting the industrial conglomerate to
upgrade its 2021 outlook. Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a
1.06-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.39-to-1 ratio favored decliners.
The S&P 500 posted 45 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 113 new highs and 17 new lows.