Critics of the company blame its recent weakness to the company not having invested in remodeling its stores and to improve its customer services.

It is easy to understand where the critics are coming from. Walking into a Sears or K-Mart store just does not have the same feeling as you get when you enter into a Wal-Mart or Target store. Wal-Mart and Target understand that customers want a certain “feel” from their stores, and they deliver. Walking into a Sears and you get the feeling that the store has been there for 25 years without change (and in most cases you would be right).

The typically busy holiday shopping season was dismal for the company, and for the quarter-to-date, K-Mart stores have seen a drop in same store sales of 4.2%, while Sears stores have seen a drop of 6%.

The company stated that it had not yet decided which K-Mart and Sears stores would be closed, but that it would make the list public on its media website once the final list had been determined. It also stated that it was not sure at this point whether or not the store closings would lead to job cuts, but it is hard to imagine that the closing of 100+ stores would not lead to job cuts.

If Sears is able to absorb the criticism it has been given, and puts its focus on remodeling and vamping up its customer service then it may have a chance to get back to its glory days, but unless it is able to make serious changes, and make the quickly, then it is hard to imagine the retailer ever getting back on the same level as its major competitors.

Wall Street reacted as expected to the news, with the stock closing the session down 27.2%, down $12.47 to $33.38.

The following video on the subject is from MarketWatch:

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 afternoon’s earnings report, analysts had been expecting to see Alcoa post earnings of $0.22 per share, but were disappointed to see earnings come in under expectations at $0.15 per share.

Despite missing its earnings estimate, the company was able to post better than expected revenues for the quarter of $6.4 billion, above the $6.2 billion that analysts had been expecting to see.

Alcoa’s CEO, Klaus Kleinfeld, blamed the lower than expected earnings numbers on falling aluminum prices, and uncertainty in Europe, which resulted in a tough environment for the company. Despite the lower than expected earnings, the company did maintain its growth forecast for the remainder of the year.

Since Alcoa is the first major company to report earnings, and since it makes aluminum for a wide variety of industries, it is viewed as a bellwether stock, and investors tend to place a lot of importance on its earnings reports. Just because Alcoa disappointed this afternoon does not necessarily mean that the rest of the earnings season is going to be weak, but it definitely does not paint a pretty picture either. We will get a better idea of what to expect during the remainder of the earnings season later this week with JP Morgan and Google report their quarterly numbers.

The stock was up a little over 2% in today’s session, but has dropped 4.2% in after hours trading.

Insurance companies win on one hand because they will have to pay out less in damages than they had anticipated, but they also win because the media hype was enough to give them an opportunity to raise rates next year on all types of property insurance.

Most of the damage incurred during the hurricane was flood damage, and unless you leave very near to the coast, chances are you do not have flood insurance on your property. Experts have estimated that damages due to Hurricane Irene would be around $2 billion, which is far less than the $6 billion in damages that the area experienced when Hurricane Isabel hit back in 2003.

Here is how a few insurance companies fared on the day:

• Allstate (ALL): +$2.06 to $26.30, up 8.5%
• Aetna (AET): + $0.93 to $39.16, up 2.4%
• Progressive (PGR): +$0.65 to $18.89, up 3.6%

The DOW finished the day up 2.2%, the NASDAQ was up 3.3%, and the S&P 500 was up 2.8%

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.

As we noted yesterday in our CarMax earnings preview, analysts were expecting to see the company post fourth quarter earnings this morning of $0.38 per share. Earnings were higher than expected, at $).39 per share, marking the 9th straight quarter of analyst beating earnings for the company.

During the same period last year CarMax had earnings of $0.33 per share.

Revenues were also above estimates at $2.25 billion, versus analyst estimates for $21.8 billion.

Despite topping earnings and revenues estimates, the stock is trading sharply lower in today’s action. The reason the stock is selling off was a drop in gross margin during the quarter to 14.2% from a previous 14.5%.

Same store sales were up 12% during the period.

The stock is trading down 7.3% on the day to $32.06, down $2.53.

GameStop had a very respectable 10% jump in sales, spurred by strong demand for hit titles such as Activision (ATVI)’s Call of Duty Black Ops.

Going into this morning’s earnings report, analysts had been expecting to see GameStop post earnings of $1.55 per share, but actual earnings came in slightly higher at $1.56.

During the same period last year the company had earnings of $1.29.

The majority of the company’s revenues comes from sales of new games, and in this area it saw a sales increase of 2.1% during the quarter. Used game sales gained more ground, rising 3.7% in the quarter. The fastest growing area of GameStop’s business was its sale of hardware devices, which were up 5.9% in the quarter.

The stock is trading up 3.2% this morning to $21.77, up $0.66.

Along with an overall up market, we also saw a couple big name stocks hit new 52 week highs during the day.

Here are a couple of notable stocks that rose to new 52 week highs today:

• Baidu (BIDU) closed the day up 4.3% to $132.58, up $5.49. The stock hit a new 52 week high of $133.97 earlier in the day.
• Discover Financial (DFS) closed the day up 5.3% to $23.44, up $1.19. The stock hit a new 52 week high of 23.64 earlier in the day.
• Caterpillar (CAT) closed the day down 0.03% to 106.76, down  -0.03. The stock hit a new 52 week high of 107.70 earlier in the day.

Shares of Caterpillar are up 4.5% on the day to $71.91, up $3.13 following better than expected results this morning before the market opened.

Analysts were forecasting $0.39 per share, and the company easily outpaced those estimates with a reported $0.50 per share.

Revenues were a bit shy of analyst estimates, but the stock is surging after it raised its forecast for full year 2010 to $2.50 to $3.25 a share, up from its previous forecast of $2.50 per share.

S&P boosted its price target on the stock to $80 a share, and maintained its Buy rating on the company.

The company noted that the global economy is definitely improving, and as a result construction has been rebounding. This helped pushed the overall market higher today, with the DOW up over 25 points in afternoon trading.

• Microsoft (MSFT) : Tech giant Microsoft set a new 52 week high today, trading up to $31.58 before closing the trading session down 1.4% on the day to $30.96, down $0.43. The company posted better than expected fiscal Q3 earnings last night following the market close.
• Apple Computer (AAPL) : Apple continues to trade strongly following better than expected earnings earlier this week. The stock hit a new all time high today of $272.18. The stock finished out the session up 1.6% to $270.83, up $4.36.
• Home Depot (HD) : Home improvement giant Home Depot set a new 52 week high today. The stock traded as high as $36.44 and closed the session just under its daily high at $36.39, up $0.67 or 1.9%. Home Depot will not be reporting its earnings until mid May.
• American Express (AXP) : Financial giant American Express set a new 52 week high today of $49.19. The stock closed the day up 2.7% at $48.05, up $1.28. The company posted better than expected earnings Thursday night, reporting $0.73 per share, verses analyst estimates for $0.63.