The Big Week in Review

The week chock full of earnings has now ended. Mixed results, really.

Amgen (AMGN) - Slumps a bit due to their sales number. Earnings were fine and grew nicely, but their top line growth apparently wasn't good enough. It's had a nice run recently, and as a long-term holding, it should do fine.

Eastman Kodak (EK) - Fairly dissappointing. Due to charges, the company lost $1B. There is a strong possibility I will be selling this one by year-end to take the tax loss. If I choose to do so, I might still buy it back sometime later, but would be forced to wait the mandatory 30 days.

North Fork Bancorp (NFB) - Their profits doubled, but they missed their earnings target. Shares didn't do too much following the announcement.

Hibernia (HIB) - Posted a major loss due to charges resulting from the hurricanes. Stock moves with Capital One Financial (COF), who is acquiring them. The deal should close some time in late November.

Juniper Networks (JNPR) - This is a recent addition to the long-term family. It posted strong earnings and revenues. Its profits jumped over 70% on more than 45% sales growth.

Linear Technology (LLTC) - Posted a slight decline in profit. They cited increased R&D costs. However, this beat the street's views, and the shares traded higher following their announcement.

Altria Group (MO) - Earnings were mixed. Tobacco was strong, but Kraft was a real stinker. But, with the recent Supreme Court ruling in their favor, we should hopefully see a break-up of the company. When that happens, I might exit out of the Kraft component and channel those funds into the tobacco components. Cheese doesn't quite have that addiction power.

St. Jude's Medical (STJ) - Mentioned earlier, they made a major purchase and posted solid earnings.

Student Loan Corp (STU) - Shares moved a little lower following their earnings, which gave a mixed picture on their current business.

Now to the two positions that were awaiting expiration Friday...

eBay (EBAY) - Earnings were strong, but their outlook was weaker than the Street had hoped. Shares came down from $42 to $39s. This means that none of my shares will get called away. I will now need to figure out what I want to do. The situation at this moment is the shares have a cost basis of $37.58. I can sell another round of options as I did the first time (two-thirds covered, one-third left to ride). Or, perhaps I can wait for a spot to just dump the position, hopefully in the $40-42 range.

Seagate Technology (STX) - Mixed earnings picture, a Bear Stearns downgrade, and a CSFB reduction in earnings estimates caused shares to come down from mid-$15s to about $14.25. So, at this point we're nearly break-even on the buy-write. Just a tad underwater. Despite Seagate being the leader in their space, I will probably exit the position next week or so.

And, there you have it... the week in review.