Palm Inc. (PALM) seemed like a company with a solid comeback plan last summer. After more than a year of downward spiraling, the company was on the verge of releasing its hottest product probably ever, the Palm Pre. This was supposed to be the wireless handset that would finally challenge the Apple (AAPL) iPhone with it's slick user interface and svelte design.

Sales of the Pre in recent quarters were indeed decent, although Palm's decision to choose Sprint Nextel (S) as its exclusive launch partner may have dampened things a bit. Although Sprint's network, at this time, fares way better than AT&T's (T) network that is constantly being made fun of, the Pre still didn't slow down iPhone purchases.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Research in Motion, Virgin Mobile, VMWare, and McAfee were today's noteworthy initiations.

• Research in Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) was initiated with an Overweight by Thomas Weisel, which thinks the company has one of the strongest growth profiles among large-cap tech stocks.
  
• Virgin Mobile (NYSE:VM) was initated with an Overweight by Thomas Weisel, which cited the company's strong global brand and low cost base.
  
• Pacific Crest initiated VMWare (NYSE:VMW) with a Sector Perform based on the company's thin float and competitive risks.
  
• McAfee (NYSE:MFE) was reinstated with a Buy by Deutsche Bank, which believes the company is one of the best positioned security vendors due to its comprehensive security platform.

OTHER INITIATIONS:

• Thomas Weisel initiated Palm (NASDAQ:PALM) with a Market Weight rating.
  
• Gabelli initated Edison International (NYSE:EIX) with a Buy rating.
  
• Bank of America initiated Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM) with a Neutral rating.

This post is in response to a question from one of my loyal readers. Loyal enough to ask me a question, that is! It's so nice to know that there's someone reading my stuff besides me.

Her question is simply; What's eBay Inc.'s (NASDAQ:EBAY) plan C? She asked this in response to eBay's decision to change its China game plan from one of open competition to one of minority partner in a shared venture. I'm not sure what her vested interest in eBay is, but her question is valid nonetheless. Here's the problem -- I'm not sure eBay has a "plan C" nor am I certain whether or not it thinks it needs one. As of this writing, eBay auction stats are pretty much in keeping with the previous two years, although its after Christmas listing count bounce-back is progressing slower than '04 and '05. It will be a couple weeks before we can get a good picture as to the true condition of listing volume going into 2007.