Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage on BloggingStocks:

• Adobe Systems Inc. (ADBE) shares rose after lower Q4 earnings and revenue beat analysts' expectations.
• Best Buy Inc. (BBY) shares sold off despite better-than-expected Q3 results due to the lower gross margin.
• Charles Schwab Corp. (SCHW) warned that Q4 earnings would come in lower than the Street view
• Discover Financial Services (DFS) shares were up after it reported better-than-expected Q4 earnings.
• First Solar Inc. (FSLR) offered a solid 2010 outlook but the consensus EPS estimate is high in the range.
• General Mills Inc. (GIS) strong Q2 results included better-than-expected earnings and a rosy outlook.

Adobe Systems (ADBE), a software business dedicated to document solutions and video-editing products, reported Q4 results Tuesday. If you're a shareholder, you might not be too happy since there were declines across the board.

Revenues dipped 17%. Earnings per share on an adjusted basis slid 35% to 39 cents. Net cash from operating activities declined 25%. Yeah, I'd say it was a bit of a disappointing release. Interestingly enough, though, it looks like the market wasn't too worried by the numbers. The stock closed higher on Tuesday by 1.6% before the report was issued. At the conclusion of the after-hours session, Adobe was unchanged.

Investors who can tolerate moderate risk should take advantage of the recent pull-back in Adobe Systems Incorporated (ADBE) shares to buy shares, and I'm obviously reiterating my buy rating for the company, first recommended on June 9, 2009 at a price of $29.77.

Further, although the U.S./global economic slowdown has weighed on Adobe's Creative Suite 4 results, the company remains 'in the catbird seat' regarding rich Internet applications, and companion web-based graphics and video production tools. Cost containment is adequate.

Analyst upgrades:

• Deutsche Bank upgraded Clorox (NYSE: CLX) to Buy from Hold on valuation and believes upside to earnings forecasts is likely. The firm raised its target on shares to $66 from $65.
• Kaufman Bros. upgraded eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) to Buy from Hold on expectations improved Marketplace fundamentals will serve as a positive catalyst for shares. The firm raised its price target on the stock to $29 from $22.
• Roth Capital believes Zumiez (NASDAQ: ZUMZ) is well positioned for improved results and margins. The firm, which upgraded shares to Buy from Hold and raised its target to $22 from $16, said September back-to-school results bode well for the holiday season and demonstrate that Zumiez can drive conversion during peak shopping periods.
• Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC) was upgraded to Sell from Conviction Sell at Goldman.
• Adobe (NASDAQ: ADBE) was upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Baird.
• Monster Worldwide (NYSE: MWW) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at JPMorgan.

Adobe Systems is on-pace to post at least a 10-12% revenue decline in FY2009 (perhaps worse), but consistent with the dominant narrative in institutional investor circles, the Street is looking right past that to a likely, substantial increase in FY2010 revenue, not including the Omniture (NASDAQ: OMTR) acquisition, pending/subject to approvals.

And that's why I'm Reiterating my Buy rating for Adobe (NASDAQ: ADBE), first recommended on June 9, 2009 at a price of $29.77. If you bought ADBE then, you're up about 8%.

Here are some highlights from last week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Adobe Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: ADBE) just beat low Q3 earnings estimates but revenue also declined.
• Best Buy Co. Inc. (NYSE: BBY) earnings fell short of estimates but revenue was better than expected.
• Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Inc. (NASDAQ: CBRL) posted better-than-expected Q4 earnings.
• Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS) posted a surprise Q3 profit but shares rose slightly on the news.
• Dress Barn Inc. (NASDAQ: DBRN) reported modest growth in both net income and revenue in Q4.
• FedEx Corp. (NYSE: FDX) said that its Q1 earnings and revenue dropped but its cash flow has improved.

The bulls just keep running. So much so that even the bears have started wearing horns and fake hooves so that they fit in a little better. A tame CPI figure on consumer inflation helped things steady and then a less-bad homebuilder survey allowed the run to continue higher. Oil prices ramped up on lower crude inventories as well. Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 9,790.35 +106.94 (1.10%)
S&P 500 1,068.76 +16.13 (1.53%)
Nasdaq 2,133.15 +30.51 (1.45%)

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Adobe Systems (NASDAQ: ADBE), a software company whose colleagues include Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), issued Q3 results on Tuesday. Revenues dropped over 20%. Adjusted income was 35 cents per share versus 50 cents per share in the year-ago quarter.

As can be seen, Adobe is still suffering from the economic downturn. Not only did sales decline on a year-over-year basis, but they also dropped sequentially.Thankfully, management was at least able to beat expectations by a penny, as indicated by data at Earnings.com. Adobe also did relatively okay with operational cash flow.

Analyst upgrades:

• Deutsche Bank upgraded Garmin (NASDAQ: GRMN) to Hold from Sell as it believes the company's second half of 2009 is tracking better than expected due to retailer restocking. Deutsche raised its target on shares to $33 from $15 but thinks Garmin's long-term trends remain unfavorable.
• Goldman upgraded Fortune Brands (NYSE: FO) to Buy from Neutral citing potential EPS improvement driven by the Home division. Fortune Brands price target to $49 from $45. Note that the firm downgraded General Mills to Neutral from Buy.
• Oppenheimer upgraded FPIC Insurance (NASDAQ: FPIC) to Outperform from Perform to reflect the company's acquisition of Advocate MD and management's commitment to share repurchases. The firm set a $49 price target on the stock.
• PPG Industries (NYSE: PPG) and Olin Corp. (NYSE: OLN) were upgraded to Neutral from Sell at UBS.
• Synovus (NYSE: SNV) was upgraded to Neutral from Underperform at BofA/Merrill.
• Take-Two (NASDAQ: TTWO) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at Piper Jaffray.

U.S. stock futures climbed Wednesday morning after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said recession is very likely over. With more data coming out this morning, the upbeat sentiment about the economy might be tested. Still, deal action from Adobe Systems further pushed positive sentiment.

Bernanke said Tuesday that the Great Recession has "very likely" ended, but he also warned that growth may be too tepid to cut the unemployment rate significantly anytime soon. "It's still going to feel like a very weak economy for some time," he said.

Back in the mid 1990s, Josh James -- who was an undergraduate -- saw huge potential in the Internet. So he teamed up with a friend, John Pestana, to create a company that helps put together web pages. The company eventually became Omniture (Nasdaq: OMTR), which is a top player in web analytics .

Well, the bet has paid off. Today Omniture sold out to Adobe (Nasdaq: ADBE) for a cool $1.8 billion. Omniture's shares ended the day at $17.32.

While On2 Technologies (AMEX: ONT) has strong video compression solutions, the company failed to get much traction over the years (a key reason was the licensing fee structure). It's been especially painful for shareholders.

But today there was some good news: Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) agreed to purchase the company for $106.5 million in stock. On the news of the deal, On2's shares spiked 49% to $0.57.

Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Adobe Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: ADBE) Q2 earnings were in line with expectations but sales beat.
• Best Buy Inc. (NYSE: BBY) beat earnings estimates for Q1, but on horrible metrics, sending shares lower.
• Carnival Corp. (NYSE: CCL) lower Q2 earnings beat expectations and previous guidance, boosting shares.
• CarMax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) Q1 profit and sales dropped, but still beat expectations, sending shares higher.
• Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS) posted a smaller-than-expected Q2 net loss and shares rose.

The father of the PDF document, Adobe Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: ADBE), is starting to push further into the web-based document creation business. That strategy puts it squarely in the cross-hairs of Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and its excellent Google Docs product, as well as software giant Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT), which is set to release a major online component with Office 2010.

Adobe indicated that a fee-based version its new online initiatives would allow businesses to covert all kinds of documents to the de-facto PDF standard, as well as hold online meetings via Acrobat.com.

Today had all the earmarks in line for another solid day of sell-offs, yet the markets held ground considering the tone this morning. The good news was low inflation, the lowest in over 50 years.

But agriculture stocks were hammered on overseas competitive news about weak pricing and demand. Then came a banking downgrade from the S&P playing catch-up. Despite the mixed performance at the end of the day, this felt like a win. Here are the unofficial closing bell levels:

DJIA: 8,497.18 (-7.49)
S&P 500: 910. 71 (-1.26)
NASDAQ: 1,808.06 (+11.88)

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