Web.com's (NASDAQ: WWWW) small business customers have certainly suffered during the recession. Yet, the company has been able to deal with it. Then again, small businesses realize that they need a strong web presence, which is exactly Web.com's laser focus.

In Q3, the company posted revenues of $26.1 million, which was up a bit from the $25.5 million in the same period a year ago. Most of the revenue came from recurring subscriptions.

I've said on many occasions that I prefer MasterCard (NYSE: MA) to Visa (NYSE: V). No, I don't mean the card products themselves. I mean the stocks. I believe Visa has better brand equity associated with it, and I think it possesses a little more depth and fundamental prowess. However, both of these companies operate on the same basic economic model: collect fees on transactions, and don't take on loan risk. So, both MasterCard and Visa do offer compelling long-term investment theses.

And, even though there were some negative outlooks on MasterCard's latest earnings report, which was released Tuesday, I have to say that I didn't find the situation too disturbing. Revenues increased only 2%. The top line was inhibited by currency effects, but it's not like we haven't heard that story before. More importantly, MasterCard posted adjusted income of $3.48 per share, representative of a 40% increase over the adjusted income recorded a year ago.

Analyst upgrades:

• FBR Capital upgraded McAfee (NYSE: MFE) to Outperform from Market Perform after channel checks indicated the company's September quarter deal flow has been stronger than expected. FBR raised its target on shares to $50 from $41.
• Thomas Weisel upgraded Adtran (NASDAQ: ADTN) to Overweight from Market Weight, citing increased wireless backhaul capex spending by Tier-1 carriers. The firm raised its target to $32 from $21.
• RBC Capital upgraded Brunswick (NYSE: BC) to Outperform from Sector Perform as the firm thinks the company no longer has liquidity risk and can generate significant profits by 2012. The firm set a $17 target on the stock.
• Bronco Drilling (NASDAQ: BRNC) was upgraded to Hold from Underperform at Jefferies.
• LSI Corp. (NYSE: LSI) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Deutsche Bank.
• UBS upgraded U.S. Airways (NYSE: LCC) and UAL Corp. (NASDAQ: UAUA) to Buy from Neutral.

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.

Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS), a credit card company that competes with Visa (NYSE: V), MasterCard (NYSE: MA), and American Express (NYSE: AXP), released earnings for the third quarter on Thursday. The company put analysts to shame by posting a profit instead of a loss according to an article from Reuters.

The projection was for a loss of 12 cents per share. Discover actually made 52 cents per share of profit, once you exclude monies received from an antitrust settlement. Wow, that's what you call being way off the mark! The disparity surprised me, so I went to our very own earnings preview to see what we were reporting for an estimate. Sure enough, it stated the exact same expectation for a loss of 12 cents.

Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS) is preparing for its upcoming turn in the earnings spotlight. The firm is scheduled to unveil its fiscal third-quarter results before the market opens Thursday, Sept. 17.

Ahead of the event, analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters are expecting Discover to swallow a loss of about 12 cents per share, down sharply from its year-ago profit of 37 cents per share. Sales for the period are expected to arrive at $743 million.

Memphis-based package delivery giant FedEx Corp. (NYSE: FDX) is generally seen as an indicator of the state of commerce in the U.S. Last week, not only did the Fed's Beige Book report suggest that the economy had stabilized over the summer, with signs of recovery in some districts, But FedEx also boosted its earnings guidance due to stronger-than-expected volume in its international priority-delivery service. So a question going in to FedEx's fiscal first-quarter report this week is whether the company is still a bellwether.

For the three months that ended in August, when FedEx opened distribution hubs in Chicago and Toledo and declared a quarterly dividend, analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters are looking for it to report that earnings fell 60.2% from a year ago to $0.49 per share. That's also down 23.4% from the previous quarter, as well as less than the recently updated outlook. First quarter revenue is expected to be down 18.3% from a year ago to $8.2 billion.

Analyst upgrades:

• Bernstein upgraded Lincoln National (NYSE: LNC) to Outperform from Market Perform based on relative valuation and expectations the company will repay TARP without a capital raise. The firm raised its target to $34 from $26.
• Thomas Weisel upgraded Ticketmaster (NASDAQ: TKTM) to Overweight from Market Weight and raised its target to $12 from $8 citing dynamic ticket pricing and the potential merger with Live Nation (NYSE: LYV).
• Citigroup upgraded Harley-Davidson (NYSE: HOG) to Hold from Sell after channel checks indicated retail sales have improved since Q2. The firm raised its target on shares to $26 from $14.
• McDermott (NYSE: MDR) was upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Credit Suisse.
• Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) was upgraded to Hold from Sell at Deutsche Bank.
• General Electric (NYSE: GE) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at JPMorgan.

American Express Company (NYSE: AXP), a company that competes with Visa Inc. (NYSE: V), MasterCard Incorporated (NYSE: MA), and Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS), issued Q2 results earlier in the week. Earnings from continuing operations dropped very steeply to 9 cents per share. How steeply? Well, the per-share profit lost 84% of its value this time around. However, it might make you feel a little better to know that 18 cents can be added back, since that was the net worth of repurchase activity relating to preferred shares from the U.S. Treasury department. Therefore, American Express took in 27 cents per share from continuing activities. According to this Reuters piece, that number met expectations.

The Reuters article also points out that revenues fell by 18% and that net charge-offs increased. Not a great picture. Reading through the press release, an investor might come away with a feeling of dread. Management mentions the not-so-strong spending by its cardmembers and the fact that loan losses are at historic levels.

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.

Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS), a credit-card company that competes with Visa (NYSE: V), MasterCard (NYSE: MA), and American Express (NYSE: AXP), reported earnings for the second quarter. According to this news summary, Discover beat expectations by posting a loss of $0.18 per share. The market thought that the loss would be as high as $0.29 per share.

If you read the actual press release, you'll see that Discover, on a reported basis, made $0.43 per share. However, we must remember that this profit included an antitrust settlement sourced to Visa and MasterCard. So, once you get rid of that money, you come up with a loss for the quarter.

Analyst upgrades:

• Goldman upgraded SanDisk (NASDAQ: SNDK) to Buy from Neutral and raised their target to $22 from $16 citing the renegotiated royalty agreement with Samsung.
• Goldman also upgraded Starwood Hotels (NYSE: HOT) to Buy from Sell and raised their target to $27 from $11 citing strong operating leverage as RevPAR recovers.
• KeyBanc upgraded Werner Enterprises (NASDAQ: WERN) to Hold from Underweight citing a recent improvement in freight demand.
• J.C. Penney (NYSE: JCP) was upgraded to buy from Underperform at Banc of America/Merrill.
• Savvis (NASDAQ: SVVS) was raised to Outperform from Perform at Oppenheimer.
• Sanofi-Aventis (NYSE: SNY) was upgraded at Citigroup to Buy from Hold.

Visa (NYSE: V), whose colleagues include American Express (NYSE: AXP), MasterCard (NYSE: MA), and Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS), reported a Q2 profit on Wednesday that was surprisingly strong. On an adjusted basis, earnings came in at 73 cents per share. Analysts were banking on only 64 cents per share, according to Reuters.

Quite frankly, I can see the disparity between Wall Street's thinking and the ultimate reality. I mean, the economy has been bad (to state the obvious), and people aren't spending as much. This means that they aren't using their credit cards like they used to. Ergo, you might expect Visa to post a lower number.

Analyst upgrades:

• Jefferies upgraded Quicksilver (NYSE: KWK) to Buy from Hold as it believes the company has many options to resolve its liquidity crisis. The firm expects shares to move towards its $10 NAV estimate and raised its target price to $10 from $7.
• Deutsche Bank upgraded Omnicom Group (NYSE: OMC) to Hold from Sell following the Q1 results as the company's margins are holding up better than previously thought. The firm raised its target price on shares to $31 from $21.
  
• Deutsche Bank also upgraded Universal Health (NYSE: UHS) following the company's better than expected Q1 results. Shares were lifted to Buy from Hold and the firm raised its target on the stock to $60 from $45.
• Barclays (NYSE: BCS) was raised to Buy from Reduce at Nomura.
  
• Orient-Express (NYSE: OEH) was lifted to Neutral from Underweight at JP Morgan.
  
• CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS) was upgraded at Goldman to Conviction Buy from Buy.

This Post was written by Minyanville contributor Minyan Peter.

Based on yesterday's Consumer Credit figures for February, in the "shoot twice, think once" world in which we increasingly live, I can already hear Congressmen condemning credit card issuers for cutting off credit to consumers.

But, before you act, I would strongly recommend that you completely ignore the headline data.

First, in a world of secular debt deleveraging, "seasonally adjusted data" is meaningless. And particularly for credit card lending, where Christmas is so important. And given the this past Christmas was a bust, the seasonal data for December, January and February don't make any sense.