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Investing.com - Top 5 things that rocked U.S. markets this week:

1. Banks Lead in Earnings; Netflix Plunges

Earnings season was in full flight for the week and the majority hit or beat Wall Street expectations.

The financial sector continued to perform well. Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) led the broker-dealer reports and Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) also topped estimates, although concerns about its succession plan hit the stock later in the day.

And it was a tale of two techs as a momentum stock fell short of what investors wanted and an old stalwart came through.

Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) stock tumbled at the start of the week after the company missed expectations on new subscribers, a key metric for the streaming company. Netflix added 5.14 million subscribers in the latest quarter, shy of analysts’ expectations for more than 6.2 million.

But after the bell Thursday, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) reported second-quarter earnings that beat consensus thanks to cloud services revenue.

2. Fed’s Powell Sees Steady Rate Increases; Trump Not Thrilled

The prospect for the path of U.S. interest rates took an interesting turn at the end of the week. At first things seemed to jibe with market expectations that the Federal Reserve will raise rates once and possibly twice before the year is out.

At his Humphey-Hawkins testimony before the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated the central bank should gradually increase interest rates.

But President Donald Trump shook some of the market’s confidence, saying on Thursday he’s “not thrilled” about the Fed hiking rates and going into more specifics on Twitter Friday.

The tweets had little overall impact on the market forecasts for upcoming rate hikes. But they did take the legs from the dollar on Friday. The U.S. Treasury Department has long had a policy of simply stating that a strong dollar is in America’s best interest.

3. Buffett Buyback Bonanza in the Offing?

Big names can still move the market. Warren Buffett showed that when Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRKa) led the financial stocks higher on Wednesday after saying that the Oracle of Omaha (and Vice Chairman Charlie Munger) would have fewer restrictions on stock buybacks.

Buffett and Munger will now be able to buy back shares when they feel those shares are below “intrinsic value.”

Under its previous buyback policy the company only repurchased shares when they were below 1.2x book value.

That led to some speculation that a big buyback could be coming after Berkshire reports earnings Aug. 3. The company hasn’t bought back stock since 2012.