Going into this afternoon’s earnings report, Apple was expected to report earnings of $7.38 per share, but actual earnings came in well below what analysts were expecting to see at just $7.02 per share. Revenues were also lower than expected at $28.3 billion, which do represent a 39 percent jump year over year, but below the $29.4 billion that analysts had been expecting to see.

One of the company’s strongest product lines is the iPhone, which was weak during its fiscal fourth quarter. With the new iPhone 4 release just around the corner, iPhone buys put off buying a new phone until this month when the 4S became available. Apple sold just 17.1 million iPhones during the quarter, down from 20.3 million during the previous quarter.

On a brighter note, Apple did issue better than expected first quarter earnings forecast. Apple typically low-balls its forward guidance while analysts forecast higher earnings, but not this time. Apple forecast that it would report first quarter earnings of $9.30 on revenues of $37 billion. Analyst have previously forecast that the company will have Q1 earnings of $9 per share on $36.7 billion in revenues.

After hours traders are selling off the stock pretty sharply, pushing shares down 6.6% to $396.80, down $27.86.

Going into this morning earnings report, analysts had been expecting to see Procter & Gamble report earnings of $0.97 per share. Actual quarterly earnings came in a penny under analyst forecasts at $0.96 per share.

In addition to posting slightly lower than expected Q3 earnings, Procter & Gamble also lowered its full year forecast as the company continues to deal with rising costs.

Run up costs in materials and fuel is forcing the company to raise its prices on several of its biggest name products including Pampers, Gillete Razors, Charmin toilet tissue, as well as Duracell batteries. Certain parts of the country will see the price increases in effect by July.

Sales were in-line with analyst estimates at $20.2 billion during the quarter.

Full the full year, the company cut its top end estimate by 5 cents to a range of $3.91 to $3.96 per share.

The stock has been severely lagging against of the overall Dow Jones average which is up around 15% over the past year. During the same period PG stock is up just 1%.

The stock initially fell following this morning’s report, but have since rebounded a bit and is currently trading up 0.4% to $64.29.

Going into this afternoon’s quarterly report, analysts are expecting to see Amazon post earnings of $0.61 per share on revenues of $9.55 billion.

During the same period last year the company had earnings of $0.66 per share with earnings of $7.13 billion.

Why Amazon Earnings Are Important:

Since Amazon is the nation’s largest online retailer so it will give us a clearer indication of what to expect from the rest of the online retailers as they get ready to release their quarterly earnings.

Amazon will be reporting its earnings following the market close, and we will update the results as well as after hours trading reaction when it becomes available.

As we noted in our Apple earnings preview, Apple was expected to post quarterly earnings of $5.36 for its fiscal second quarter this afternoon. Actual earnings came in well above estimates at $6.40 per share.

Revenues were also better than expected at $24.7 billion, while analysts were expecting $23.4 billion.

The quarter earnings mark a 98% jump from the same period last year, while year over year revenue growth was an impressive 83%.

Once again the iPhone was a huge success for the company, with 18.5 million devices sold during the second quarter alone, well above what analysts were expecting to see.

As we noted in our earnings preview, iPad 2 sales were a concern going into today’s report. Supply constraints have been weighing on the company and hampering its ability to meet strong demand for the tablet, and this did indeed impact quarterly sales of the new tablet.

Apple sold 4.7 million iPads during the period, which was below forecasts for between 6 and 8 million, but its strong iPhone sales more than made up for the disappointing iPad numbers.

Mac sales were up 28% year over year. iPod sales have been slowing down for Apple, and were down again this quarter by 17% year over year as consumers have been shying away from iPods and just using their iPhones and iPads to handle their music needs.

All in all, another great quarter for Apple, and the stock is being rewarded by after hours traders which have pushed shares up 3.6% to $354.84, up $12.43.

Going into this afternoon’s earnings report, analysts are expecting to see Apple report earnings of $5.36 per share. During the same period last year the company had earnings of $3.33 per share.

It has been a busy quarter for Apple, which launched the iPad 2, began its deal to sell iPhones through Verizon, and launched new MacBook pros.

The one thing that have investors a bit concerned is the number of iPad 2′s that the company sold during the quarter. Analysts forecast that the company would sell between 6 and 8 million units, but Apple made statements earlier this week that could be interpreted as though the company only sold a bit over 4 million of its new iPad 2.

Even if the iPad 2 sales numbers are a bit weak, it could still turn out to be a very strong quarter for the company, which has insinuated that it sold over 18 million iPhones during the quarter. The iPhone has a much larger profit margin for Apple, so a strong iPhone quarter could easily make up for any weakness the company made have had with its iPad sales.

Apple retail stores continue to face demand problems for the iPad 2, so we will be looking for any statements regarding the supply / demand situation for the popular tablet.

Results will come out following today’s market close, and we will update all the results and market reaction when they become available.

The stock is trading up 2.2% in morning trading to $345.29, up $7.43.

What makes tomorrow’s conference call all the more interesting to investors is that it will mark the first time that Larry Page will make public comments since he assumed his original role as the company’s CEO.

Page, who was one of the company’s founders, announced in late January his intention to take pace his CEO duties, but has been silent ever since, causing a bit of concern among investors as to how he intends to run the company.

His silence is partly to blame for why Google stock has traded down around 9% since he made his announcement. Should investors get served positive earnings and like what they hear from Page, the stock could make a nice rebound in the weeks to come.

The company has announced that it intends to eliminate bureaucracy in order to get new products more quickly to the market. Google also is undergoing a major increase in its staffing, which by adding an additional 6,200 will increase its payroll expense by around 25% by the end of the current year.

Revenues are expected to come in at $6.3 billion during the quarter.

Ford benefited from sales in new and refreshed models of its vehicles, in addition to greater discounts than General Motors offered to its customers.

During the month, Ford sold 212,295 vehicles, versus 206,621 for General Motors.

The good news for General Motors is that its sales figures marked a 9.6% rise in sales… the bad news is that analysts had been expecting to see the company report a 20% jump in sales during the month.

Analysts had been expecting to see Ford post a 13% increase in sales, but its actual sales number represent a 16% increase for the month.

Beating General Motors is a major accomplishment for Ford, and something that it has only been able to accomplish twice in the past 13 years.

The auto industry is definitely starting to show signs of life. Industrywide, sales of light vehicles were a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 13.1 million, above the 12.9 million that analysts had forecast for the month.

The war of American car makers is still being won by General Motors, which outpaced Ford through the first three months of the year by a count of 592,545 to 495,508.

Going into tomorrow’s earnings report, analysts are expecting to see Carmax report earnings of $0.38 per share. During the same period last year the company had earnings of $0.33.

Carmax has a strong history of posting better than expected earnings… easily surpassing analyst estimates for each of its past 8 quarters.

Over the past month the stock had been in steady downward trend, but has traded up slightly higher over the past week after the stock was upgraded by Robert W. Baird & Co. to Outperform from Neutral, and raised its price target on the stock to $40 from $38.

Even with its move higher over the past week, the stock is still well below where it was trading in mid-February, so there is still plenty of room for the stock to trade higher should it report its 9th consecutive quarter of better than expected earnings.

KMX stock closed Wednesday’s trading session up 1.9% to $34.59, up $0.64.

Here are a few of the names that will be reporting tomorrow:

• Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY) : Bristol Myers will be reporting its first quarter results tomorrow. The company is expected to report earnings of $0.51 per share, verses $0.41 during the same period last year. The stock closed the day up 0.5% to $24.34 and will report earnings before the market opens.
• Exxon Mobil (XOM) : Exxon will be reporting its first quarter results tomorrow. The company is expected to report $1.41 per share, compared to $0.92 during the same period last year. It will announce its results before the market opens. Exxon stock traded up 1.35% today to $69.19.
• Procter & Gamble (PG) : Procter & Gamble will be reporting its fiscal third quarter results tomorrow. The company is expected to report earnings of $0.82 per share, compared to $0.84 during the same period last year. The stock finished the day up 0.87% to $63.17 and will announce its quarterly results before the market opens.

• DuPont (DD) : DuPont is going to be reporting its first quarter numbers tomorrow. Analysts have forecast earnings of $1.06, verses $0.54 during the same period last year. The company will be announcing earnings before the market opens in the morning. The stock is trading down 0.9% today to $40.57.
• Xilinx (XLNX) : Xilinx is due to report fiscal fourth quarter numbers tomorrow, and analysts forecasts are for $0.45 per share. During the same period last year the company had earnings of $0.20 per share. The stock is trading down 1.4% today to $26.83. Earnings will be released after the market closes tomorrow.
• Sprint Nextel (S) : Sprint is expected to post a loss of $0.17 for its first quarter tomorrow before the market opens. During the same period last year the company had a loss of $0.21. The stock is trading down 0.8% today to $4.20.
• General Dynamics (GD) : General Dynamics will report its first quarter numbers tomorrow before the market opens, and Wall Street is expecting to see the company post $1.51 per share. During the same period last year the company had earnings of $1.54 per share. The stock is trading down 0.4% today to $78.33.