I was checking out an article over at GuruFocus on companies that have recently raised their dividend payments to shareholders. The Gap, Inc. (GPS) was on the list. I decided to take a brief look at the stock's current status.

At the time of this writing, shares of the retailer were off fractionally, priced at a quote of $21.44. The 52-week low for the shares is $16.62 while the 52-week high is $26.34. Don't you hate that? The stock is basically stuck in the middle of the range. So which way is it going to go?

Analyst Upgrades

• Wells Fargo (WFC) to conviction buy from neutral at Goldman.
• Adobe (ADBE) to buy from neutral at UBS.
• Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) to outperform from market perform at FBR Capital.
• Vail Resorts (MTN) and Goldcorp (GG) to buy from hold at Deutsche Bank.
• OmniVision (OVTI) to overweight from neutral at JPMorgan.
• Penn Virginia (PVA) to hold from sell at Canaccord.
• Hub Group (HUBG) to outperform from market perform at Morgan Keegan.

Analyst Upgrades

• Research In Motion (RIMM) to buy from sell and Gap (GPS) to hold from sell at Citigroup.
• Archer Daniels (ADM) and Airgas (ARG) to buy from hold at Jefferies.
• NCR Corp. (NCR) to conviction buy from neutral at Goldman.
• Valero Energy (VLO) to top pick from sector perform and Western Refining (WNR) to outperform from underperform at RBC Capital.
• Fred's (FRED) to overweight from neutral at JP Morgan.
• Marsh & McLennan (MMC), Willis Group (WSH) and Brown & Brown (BRO) to equal weight from underweight at Barclays.
• Host Hotels (HST) to outperform from neutral at RW Baird.
• La-Z-Boy (LZB) to strong buy from market perform at Raymond James.

Analyst Upgrades

• Diamond Offshore (DO) to conviction buy from sell and Baker Hughes (BHI) to buy from neutral at Goldman.
• Frontier Communications (FTR) to outperform from market perform at Wells Fargo.
• Syntel (SYNT) to outperform from market perform at Wells Fargo, to buy from hold at Deutsche Bank and to buy from neutral at Janney Capital.
• Kulicke & Soffa (KLIC) and Fiserv (FISV) to outperform from perform at Oppenheimer.
• 3M (MMM) to neutral from underweight and Tyco (TYC) to overweight from neutral at JPMorgan.
• Collective Brands (PSS) and Nordstrom (JWN) to overweight from equal weight, as well as Foot Locker (FL) to equal weight from underweight, at Morgan Stanley.
• Amazon.com (AMZN) to buy from hold at Lazard Capital.
• Yamana Gold (AUY) to outperform from neutral at Credit Suisse.

A parade of retailers have stepped up Thursday morning to unveil their December sales results, including The Gap Inc. (GPS). The jeans giant confessed to an unexpected 3% decline in same-store sales for the month, falling well short of analysts' expectations for an increase of 2.6%.

Gap North America was hit hardest, with same-store sales tumbling 8% for the month. The only business segment to record a gain for December was Banana Republic North America, as same-store sales improved 1%.

Options players rushed to place their bets on The Gap (GPS) Tuesday, with volume rising to five times the norm within the first hour of trading. Taking a closer look at the major block trades, it looks as though one speculator is anticipating a major price swing from GPS during the next year.

Specifically, the trader opened a long strangle on GPS by purchasing 2,619 January 2012 20-strike calls, and simultaneously buying 2,619 January 2012 17.50 puts. This two-legged option strategy allows the trader to benefit from a drastic move in the underlying equity, regardless of whether the shares move higher or lower.

Call options were in heavy rotation Monday on The Gap (GPS). Within the first hour of trading, 3,350 of these bullishly oriented options crossed the tape -- about four times the expected number of call contracts. The bulk of this activity took place at The Gap's January 2011 22.50 call, where 3,031 contracts were traded. Approximately 77% of these calls changed hands at the ask price, indicating they were purchased.

However, this skew toward calls simply continues a recent trend for GPS. During the past 10 days, speculators on the International Securities Exchange (ISE) have bought to open 5.99 calls for every put on the retailer. This ratio ranks above 75% of other such readings taken during the previous year, indicating that traders on the ISE have purchased calls over puts at a faster pace just 25% of the time.

Thursday afternoon, Gap (GPS) reported that its third-quarter earnings increased 9% compared to a year ago.

In the most recent quarter, the retailer earned 48 cents per diluted share compared to 44 cents per diluted share a year ago. The company's net earnings dropped 1% to $303 million from $307 million a year ago. The company's net sales increased 2% to $3.65 billion, up from $3.59 billion a year ago. Furthermore, the company's operating income increased a percentage point to $504 million from $500 million a year ago.

U.S. stock futures are lower this morning after Cisco Systems (CSCO) issued a weak revenue forecast last night, and China reported 4.4% surge in its consumer-price index in October. Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 14 points at 11,288.00, while S&P 500 futures moved down 2.80 points to 1,211.30. Nasdaq 100 futures dropped 12.75 points to 2,161.75.

However, U.S. markets did gain yesterday, with the Dow Jones industrial average rising 0.1%, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index gaining 0.4% and the Nasdaq Composite Index advancing 0.6%.

Analyst Upgrades

• BB&T (BBT) was upgraded to buy from neutral at Janney Montgomery.
• Amylin (AMLN) was upgraded to outperform from market perform at Leerink.
• Wells Fargo upgraded Morton's Restaurant (MRT) to outperform from market perform.
• Check Point (CHKP) was upgraded to overweight from neutral at HSBC.
• Deutsche Bank upgraded Excel Maritime (EXM) to buy from hold.
• JinkoSolar (JKS) was upgraded to buy from hold at Auriga.
• Piper Jaffray upgraded Compellent (CML) to overweight from neutral.
• BofA/Merrill upgraded Crane (CR) to buy from neutral.
• Goldman upgraded Wisconsin Energy (WEC) to conviction buy from buy and American Electric (AEP) to buy from neutral.
• Motorola (MOT) was upgraded due to increasing carrier support by MKM Partners.
• Under Armour (UA) was upgraded to buy from neutral at Sterne Agee.

Today was a mixed bag that frankly could have gone other way. A higher headline figure on wholesale inflation from PPI and a worse weekly jobless claims figure were matched with a wide trade deficit. To make matters worse, a 30-Year Treasury auction went poorly and suddenly long-bond yields are at the highest levels of a few weeks.

Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow Jones 11,094.57 -1.51 (-0.01%)
S&P 500 1,173.81 -4.29 (-0.36%)
Nasdaq 2,435.38 -5.85 (-0.24%)

Top Analyst Calls

Stocks made a new push today ahead of earnings season. Where the market goes from here will most likely be dependent upon the reaction the spate of earnings this week. The news that the FOMC Minutes showed a less optimistic but not definite move of quantitative easing helped to keep things from getting out of hand.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow Jones 11,020.33 +9.99 (0.09%)
S&P 500 1,169.72 +4.40 (0.38%)
Nasdaq 2,417.92 +15.59 (0.65%)

Top Analyst Calls

Aeropostale (ARO), a mall chain with colleagues like American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) and Gap (GPS), reported same-store sales for the month of September this week. They seemed relatively decent to me, even though they didn't measure up to the previous year's performance.

Last month, the company saw a 3% expansion in the metric, according to the press release. By comparison, same-store sales rose 19% in September 2009. Hey, don't fret about it. You're not going to generate growth like that all the time; it just doesn't happen. A 3% increase is fine considering the economy. On a year-to-date basis, comps are higher by 4% versus a gain of 12% in last year's similar frame.

Fashion firm Gap (GPS) has had its fair share of struggles recently -- what with the economic crisis and all, not many people want to dish out a lot of money for khakis and tight sweaters. In recent months, Gap has seen sales cool and reported that same-store sales dropped 4% during the second quarter.

So, what do you do with the holiday shopping season approaching and sales slumping? Do you drop prices across the board to try and attract more shoppers? Do you advertise these new prices so cash-strapped college kids know they can now get their khakis and button-ups cheaper? No. The brand geniuses over at the Gap decide this is time to replace the companies iconic blue box logo with something a bit more modern.

Tech is alive, retail is not dead, wholesale inventory didn't kill us, and M&A continues. What double-dip recession? The markets were all in positive territory until the end of the day and the final decision between red and black on the day was not a known certainty until the final minutes. Gold hit a new all-time high as uncertainty and risk still reigns.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow Jones 10,526.49 -17.64 (-0.17%)
S&P 500 1,121.10 -0.80 (-0.07%)
Nasdaq 2,289.77 +4.06 (0.18%)

Top Analyst Calls