The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA down about 33 points to12,675.75 (-0.26%), the NASDAQ rose just 2 points (0.09%) to 2,786.64, and the S&P 500 fell -0.10% or just more than 1 point to 1,314.63.

There were several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) maintained as ‘outperform’ with a $100 target price at Credit Suisse; Pan American Silver Corp. (NASDAQ: PAAS) maintained as ‘outperform’ but estimates lowered at Credit Suisse; Halliburton Co. (NYSE: HAL) maintained as ‘buy’ but target price lowered to $54 at Argus; Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) reiterated as ‘buy’ and target price raised to $51 at Argus; ;and Michael Kors Holdings Ltd. (NYSE: KORS) started as ‘overweight’ at Morgan Stanley, as ‘outperform’ at Baird, and as ‘buy’ at Goldman Sachs.

Earnings reports since markets closed on last night have led to some price changes as of the last half hour of trading today: Air Products and Chemicals Inc. (NYSE: APD) is down nearly -3% at $87.29; Baker Hughes Inc. (NYSE: BHI) is down -0.57% at $47.46; Clearwire Corp. (NASDAQ: CLWR) is up 2% at $1.79; EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) is up 6.7% at $25.01; Western Digital Corp. (NYSE: WDC) is up 6.2% at $36.85; CSX Corp. (NYSE: CSX) is down -3.5% at $21.89; and Zions Bancorp. (NYSE: ZION) is down -7.6% at $17.15. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) reports earnings after markets close today. See our coverage here.

Other standouts from today include the following stocks:

BioLineRx Ltd. (NASDAQ: BLRX) is up nearly 79% at $5.88 after posting a new 52-week high today of $6.87. The biopharmaceutical company has signed an exclusive worldwide licensing agreement with a French company to develop and market its hepatitis C drug.

Lee Enterprises Inc. (NYSE: LEE) is up more than 26% at $1.39. The newspaper company has been granted permission to exit bankruptcy protection.

The Bon-Ton Stores Inc. (NASDAQ: BONT) is up nearly 18% at $3.81. The department store operator has hired a new CEO who was previously the CEO at Lord & Taylor, before that chain was acquired by a Canadian company.

InterDigital Inc. (NASDAQ: IDCC) is down nearly -20% at $35.68. The wireless technology developed has shut down its “strategic review” without finding a buyer and will continue to seek additional patent sales and licensing agreements.

Achillion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: ACHN) is up more than 17% at $10.79. The drug company, which is developing its own hepatitis C drug, is enjoying a halo effect from BioLineRx’s announcement.

Stay tuned for Wednesday. President Barack Obama delivers his state of the union address at 9:00 P.M ET tonight. We have noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 7:00 a.m. – Mortgage Bankers Association purchase applications
• 10:00 a.m. – Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) house price index
• 10:30 a.m. – EIA weekly petroleum status report
• 10:30 a.m. – 5-year Treasury note auction
• 2:15 p.m. – Fed chairman Ben Bernanke press conference

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InterDigital Inc. (NASDAQ: IDCC) was down 3.3% today as is, but now the company is getting slashed and burned on news of what many had considered an obvious coming outcome.  The company ended its strategic review process and it did not find a buyer for its deep patent collection.  Now it is going to proceed on its own licensing or selling patents.  Shares are down over 16% at $37.10 in the after-hours against a 52-week range of $34.61 to $82.50.
 
NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) was down 3% after the Texas Instruments earnings but now shares are down “only” about 0.6% after closing up 2.7% on the day.

Polycom Inc. (NASDAQ: PLCM) has a history of big hits and bad misses, but tonight’s reaction has shares on the up and up.  After beating earnings handily, Polycom shares are up 9.6% at $20.29 and that is after closing up almost 4% today. 

Texas Instruments Inc. (NYSE: TXN) was down initially due to headlines showing GAAP earnings above estimates but the chip giant is now up over 3% ay $34.25 in the after-hours session against a 52-week range of $24.34 to $36.71.

VMware Inc. (NYSE: VMW) closed down 2.4% at $86.00 today but shares are up 5% at $90.50 on almost 1 million shares after just over an hour after the 4PM closing bell.  The virtualization leader said sales rose 27% to $1.06 billion and it sees revenues of $1.015 billion to $1.04 billion for the first quarter of 2012.  These are being taken as above plan.  The news has the (former) parent company of EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) up about 1.8% at $23.87 on over 2 million after-hours shares.

Western Digital Corporation (NYSE: WDC) may have seen earnings drop almost 36%, but the update is proving to be above plan and it claims to be making much more progress in Thai floods.  Shares closed up marginally today and the after-hours reaction has shares up 4.4% at $36.25 versus a 52-week range of $22.64 to $41.87.

Zions Bancorporation (NASDAQ: ZION) posted earnings light at $0.30 versus estimates of $0.33.  Its book value per common shares grew to $25.02 from $24.78 one quarter earlier and shares are down 3% at $17.98 in the after-hours.

JON C. OGG

BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) Cut to Neutral at Citigroup.
EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) Reiterated Outperform at Credit Suisse.
Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) Maintained Buy but cut target to $700 at Canaccord Genuity.
Humana Inc. (NYSE: HUM) Cut to Market Perform at Wells Fargo.
ICICI Bank Ltd. (NYSE: IBN) Cut to Underperform and named Bear of the Day at Zacks.
Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) Cut to Hold at Kaufman; Reiterated Outperform and raised target to $35 at Credit Suisse; Maintained Hold with $24 target at Canaccord Genuity.
JDS Uniphase Corporation (NASDAQ: JDSU) Raised to Buy at Stifel Nicolaus.
Johnson Controls Inc. (NYSE: JCI) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan.
NCI. Inc. (NASDAQ: NCIT) Cut to Underperform at Wells Fargo.
Tsakos Energy Navigation Ltd. Co. (NYSE: TNP) Raised to Outperform at Credit Suisse.
Texas Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ: TXN) Cut to Hold at Needham.
Tractor Supply Co. (NASDAQ: TSCO) Reiterated Buy and raised target to $92 at Argus.
Valero Energy Corporation (NYSE: VLO) Reiterated Buy with $35 price target at Argus.
Western Union Co. (NYSE: WU) Reiterated Outperform as Bull of the Day at Zacks.

Carnival Corporation (NYSE: CCL) and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (NYSE: RCL) lowered targets and estimates by Credit Suisse.

If you enjoyed the top analyst calls, you can sign up in the box below to join our morning email list to receive news directly in your inbox each morning. We include major analyst upgrades and downgrades, IPO and M&A news, special situation developments, observations on Warren Buffett and key market gurus, as well as special exclusive feature stories.

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JON C. OGG

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA up about 21 points to 12,418.57 (0.17%), the NASDAQ fell less than 1 point (-0.01%) to 2,648.36, and the S&P 500 rose 0.02% or less than 1 point to 1,277.31.

There were several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) added to ‘US Focus List’ at Credit Suisse; General Dynamics Corp. (NYSE: GD) raised to ‘overweight’ at JPMorgan; Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) reiterated ‘buy’ with $94 target price at Canaccord Genuity; Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. (NYSE: POT) started as ‘underperform’ at National Bank; and Tivo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO) raised to ‘overweight’ at Evercore Partners.

Earnings reports of note since markets closed yesterday include: Unifirst Corp. (NYSE: UNF) is up more than 3% at $59.83; and Progress Software Corp. (NASDAQ: PRGS) is down more than -11% at $17.55. Tomorrow sees earnings from Constellation Brands Inc. (NYSE: STZ), Monsanto Co. (NYSE: MON), and Family Dollar Stores Inc. (NYSE: FDO) among others.

Other standouts from today include the following stocks:

LCA-Vision Inc. (NASDAQ: LCAV) is up more than 40% at $4.33. The laser vision correction system provider said that it performed more than 14,000 procedures in the fourth quarter, up 30% year-over-year.

Rare Element Resources Ltd. (AMEX: REE) is up more than 27% at $4.53. The rare earths miner announced that its resource at the company’s Bear Lodge project is 38% higher than previously believed.

Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) is up nearly 11% at $80.02. The video distributor reported that it streamed more than 2 billion hours of video in the fourth quarter. More details on this story are available here.

Acme Packet Inc. (NASDAQ: APKT) is down more than -19% at $25.65, after posting a new 52-week low of $25.20 early this morning. The networking company warned on earnings last night. We have more coverage here.

Life Partners Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: LPHI) is down more than -15% at $5.38. The life insurance company has been accused of accounting fraud by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Stay tuned for Thursday. Here are the noteworthy events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 7:30 a.m. – Challenger Gray & Christmas job-cut report
• 8:15 a.m. – ADP employment report
• 8:30 a.m. – Weekly initial unemployment benefits claims report
• 10:00 a.m. – ISM non-manufacturing index
• 10:30 a.m. – EIA weekly natural gas report
• 11:00 a.m. – EIA weekly petroleum status report
• 4:30 a.m. – Federal Reserve balance sheet and money supply reports

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Acme Packet, Inc. (NASDAQ: APKT) Cut to Neutral at Wedbush; estimates and targets lowered after revenue warnings from Morgan Keegan and Wells Fargo.
Affymetrix Inc. (NASDAQ: AFFX) Raised to Neutral from Underweight at JPMorgan.
AK Steel Holding Corporation (NYSE: AKS) Raised to Neutral at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) Reiterated Outperform with $500 target and raised estimates at Credit Suisse.
Crown Castle International Corp. (NYSE: CCI) Started as Buy at Stifel Nicolaus.
EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) added to the U.S. Focus List at Credit Suisse.
General Dynamics Corporation (NYSE: GD) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) Reiterated Buy with $94 target at Canaccord Genuity.
Lockheed Martin Corporation (NYSE: LMT) Cut to Underperform by RBC Capital Markets.
Mosaic Co. (NYSE: MOS) Cut to Neutral at Citigroup.
NetApp Inc. (NASDAQ: NTAP) Cut to Neutral from Outperform at Credit Suisse.
Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan, Inc. (NYSE: POT) Started as Underperform at National Bank.
Steel Dynamics Inc. (NASDAQ: STLD) Raised to Buy at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
TiVo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO) Raised to Overweight at Evercore Partners.

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JON C. OGG

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is a company which often mirrors Oracle’s business trends when times are normalized.  While the companies have historically competed for different spending dollars from corporations and governments, a spending slowdown in the network is often the same on the customer relationship management side.  Cisco shares are down only 2% at $18.03.

Speaking of identical issues, if Oracle is slowing then “The Baby Oracle” of Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM) has to be facing many of the same issues.  Its shares are down 8% at $95.75 so far today.

If things are bad at Oracle, SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) is likely having a very hard time as well in the enterprise and CRM markets.  Its ADRs are the proof as they are down 5.4% at $52.70.

International Business Machines Corporation (NYSE: IBM) is down 3.6% at $180.50 and shares are now down more than $10 from when the Warren Buffett investment news hit.  The company has a new CEO starting as well and it is hard to imagine that its IT operations on the enterprise and government side are not that different from how Oracle described its quarter and guidance. 

What about enterprise storage, and what about enterprise virtualization?  EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) and VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW) are the perfect examples as much of the same spending dollars overlap here.  EMC shares are down 4% at $21.55 and VMware shares are down 8% at $78.00. 

Ditto for Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT) with shares down 5.6% more at $39.65, although Red Hat shares had already been spanked yesterday after disappointing earnings as the stock went from about $46 to $42 on the news.

And what about Symantec Corporation (NASDAQ: SYMC) for security and storage solutions?  After another failed attempt at a share price breakout it shares are already back down at the bottom of a long-term trading range.  Symantec shares are trading down 3.1% at $15.15 and hit a new 52-week low.

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) and others had all indicated a slower spending climate but Oracle is not likely able to use the “Thailand flooding” example.  Intel is lower by less than 1% at $23.64.  Another surprise “only down a tad” is Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) with shares down only 0.55% at $25.88 on the day.  If things are slow on the consumer PC business and if enterprise spending and international currency woes are facing Oracle it would seem logical that Microsoft’s O/S sales are at risk too.

The iShares S&P North Amer Tech-Software (NYSE: IGV) are not super-active in trading volume but the ETF shares are down 4.5% at $53.33 on the day.

This is only a snapshot of the downstream fallout.  The real situation is much broader and now the hope has to reside that Oracle’s earnings debacle was a fluke.  Or maybe it is the curse of Sun Microsystems hanging over the company.

JON C. OGG

Apple hit an all-time high this week at $426.70. The stock closed at $422.20 on Tuesday just ahead of earnings. After the announcement, shares fell to about $400, which is where they are likely to open today. Analysts have a consensus price target of roughly $499.00 on the stock, which implies an upside of about 18% from Tuesday’s close, and an upside of 24.5% from $400. 24/7 Wall St. looked at these analyst numbers and found more than ten technology stocks with more implied upside.

In our screen, we only included companies with a market cap of $1 billion and higher. We also restricted the list to companies that are expected to post positive earnings this year and next and to those with long-term operating histories. We used consensus data on earnings and consensus analyst price targets from Thomson Reuters. We did additional analysis of our own on each company. Oddly enough, several of these companies are even tied to Apple’s businesses.

We include the most recent closing share prices, a 52-week range for comparison, and the Thomson Reuters consensus price target for the next twelve months. We have identified what the implied upside is to that price target, shown a year-to-date change from Finviz.com, and given a forward P/E ratio based on next year (2012 in most cases) earnings estimates.

Some of these stocks are in technology, some are not.  Our criteria is to eliminate junk: no companies losing money, no declining earnings, no fresh implosions, no Chinese ADRs, no stuck multi-year turnarounds, and no restructurings that are changing the identity of a company. We also wanted to find companies where analysts still believe that earnings in 2012 will be higher than in 2011, and we eliminated companies in the troubled banking, housing, and auto sectors.  We screened out the volatile commodity stocks, used a multi-billion market cap floor, demanded many years of operating history, and even made sure that each stock had 10 or more analysts covering the stock to make sure that consensus was truly a consensus rather than a straw-poll.

The screened stocks expected to outperform Apple are as follows: Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT); EI DuPont de Nemours & Co. (NYSE: DD); EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC); FedEx Corporation (NYSE: FDX); General Electric Company (NYSE: GE); Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG); Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR); QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ: QCOM); SanDisk Corporation (NASDAQ: SNDK); Staples, Inc. (NASDAQ: SPLS); Urban Outfitters Inc. (NASDAQ: URBN); and Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS).  A few names with more upside that might immediately come to mind are Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX), OpenTable, Inc. (NASDAQ: OPEN), or First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR).  Unfortunately, these stocks, even if they do technically have higher implied upside according to analysts, are all under death watch due to a share price implosion.  The consensus targets and any earnings estimates are from Thomson Reuters and Yahoo! Finance.

There is some interesting jawboning going on here, and someone will end up being right and someone will end up being wrong.  Information Week magazine ran an article recently (also at the Techweb site under UBM) on the matter.  VMware’s pricing appears to have not changed, but the article noted, “vSphere 5.0. At that time, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that VMware was not changing its base pricing. And while that’s true, the company has drastically revamped how it treats and now charges for memory usage. The result will be much higher licensing costs for many users.”

This may be nothing short of a stealth price hike by putting some limits on data usage.  In one case, the article noted showed that the $3,495 per license can go to $13,980 for this one server under vSphere 5.  One forum case, which is probably more than up for debate by the company, noted that the effective price increase was 380%.  ZDNet showed a change to this policy, but the damage may have already been done.  When customers push back it can create a more difficult future for relations.

Here is where this all gets interesting.  Analysts have been stepping over themselves to raise the ratings on VMware.  In the middle of August alone, there have been analyst upgrades by Barclays, CRedit Suisse, FBR Capital, and Collins Stewart.  Wells Fargo also upgraded the company in early August, based on the pricing power.

The big challenge here is EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) due to its super-majority ownership position in VMware.  While it may not meddle in pricing, it will certainly meddle if the business gets interrupted or if the image gets bashed too much.

This also opens the door for Citrix Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CTXS) and its Xen virtualization, although you might not know it if you see that Citrix stock is close to a 52-week low.

Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) is a night and day different company than VMware.  Comparing virtualization to video rentals might be too odd, but what is not different at all is the pricing structure changes and the fallout that can come from it.  Netflix has lost almost one-third of its value since its latest “price structure change.”

The selling of stocks has also been extremely tough on VMware,  Since the mid-July peak above $110.00 per share, VMware has fallen to under $78.00.  That is probably the market more than pricing, but it seems as though there is a longer-term risk here that investors are trying to grapple with.

Analysts on Wall Street may cheer pricing power all day long, but a customer revolt may bring an opposite outcome.

JON C. OGG

No money was injured while filming

At about mid-day, the Dow is off nearly -4%, the Nasdaq is off nearly -4.5%, and the S&P 500 is down just over -4%. It’s not a good day, and things are really looking nasty for several stocks. Here’s a look at some of today’s biggest losers so far.

NetApp Inc. (NASDAQ: NTAP) is down about -19% and has posted a new 52-week intra-day low of $33.32 following a poor earnings report, a weak forecast, and a downgrade from FBN. The stock is setting the pace for tech weakness after it pointed out that NetApp is expecting a “dramatic slowdown” in sales.

JDS Uniphase Corp. (NASDAQ: JDSU) is off -10.5%, at $10.47, within a 52-week range of $9.09-$29.12. The company managed to dodge a downgrade, but yesterday’s earnings and guidance combined with NetApp’s warning have clobbered the stock.

Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. (NYSE: IVR) is off more than -8.5%, at $17.63, in a 52-week range of $16.48-$24.07. The company has announced a secondary offering of 20 million shares at $18.37/share, $0.92/share lower than yesterday’s closing price. Shareholders hate that sort of thing.

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) shares are off around -7%, at $27.90, in a 52-week range of $26.25-$51.50. There’s no specific news that would lead to this drop, just the usual worries on European debt, home sales, and any of a number of economic concerns.

Camelot Information Systems Inc. (NYSE: CIS) is down more than -31%, at $5.87, having already posted a new 52-week low this morning of $4.90. That’s down nearly -80% from its 52-week high of $28.18. The company missed both profit and revenue estimates. There have also been some questions recently about the company’s truthfulness in reporting.

Gentium SpA (NASDAQ: GENT) is off more than -30%, at $6.12, within a 52-week range of $4.53-$13.69. The Italian drug maker has withdrawn a marketing application for an experimental treatment for complications resulting from stem cell transplants.

Acme Packet, Inc. (NASDAQ: APKT) is down nearly -18%, at $41.25, in a 52-week range of $30.70-$84.50. The communications equipment maker’s stock was downgraded by Pacific Crest, and is wallowing in the NetApp disaster.

Riverbed Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: RVBD) is down nearly -16%, at $20.53, in a 52-week range of $17.36-$44.70. Another communications equipment vendor and another downgrade at Pacific Crest.

The Direxion Daily Technology Bull 3X Shares (NYSE: TYH) is down nearly -16%, at $29.00, in a 52-week range of $23.66-$57.23. The triple-leveraged ETF is getting pulverized on its long technology bet.

MGM Resorts International (NYSE: MGM) is off -12%, at $10.15, in a 52-week range of $8.92-$16.94. Investor Kirk Kerkorian’s Tracinda Corp. reported yesterday that he has shed 20 million MGM shares. Tracinda is still the largest shareholder in MGM with nearly a stake of nearly 27% .

EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) is off more than -10%, at $20.22, in a 52-week range of $17.90-$28.73. The company is down about -24% in the past month, and today is following the downward spiral created by NetApp.

Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) is among the volume leaders with the largest share price downturns today. Shares are down nearly -7%, at $6.96, in a 52-week range of $6.31-$15.31. Worries about bank stocks are growing as reports on the global economy get gloomier.

Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) has already traded more shares than its daily average of more than 34 million. Shares are off nearly -8%, at $25.35, within a 52-week range of $21.66-$36.50. No particular news except the general disillusionment with tech stocks following NetApp’s pronouncement.

Paul Ausick