Here are some highlights from last week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Activision Blizzard Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) shares rose after it reaffirmed its full-year earnings and sales outlook.
• Automatic Data Processing Inc. (NASDAQ: ADP) will have low double-digit EPS growth, predicts one analyst.
• AutoZone Inc. (NYSE: AZO) posted a decline in earnings but a small rise in sales, sending shares lower.
• Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (NASDAQ: BBBY) posted better-than-expected Q2 earnings and higher revenue.
• CarMax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) rallied to a new 52-week high after topping analysts' Q2 earnings expectations.
• Carnival Corp. (NYSE: CCL) reported better-than-expected Q3 results and raised its full-year guidance.

Rite Aid Corp. (NYSE: RAD) wallowed in the red Thursday morning, after the drugstore chain disappointed Wall Street with its second-quarter earnings and full-year guidance.

Rite Aid said its quarterly loss narrowed to $116 million, or 14 cents per share, while revenue dwindled 2.7% to $6.3 billion. Same-store sales dipped 1.1%, while gross margin contracted from 27.4% to 26.7%.

Much of the focus this week will no doubt be on the FOMC meeting on interest rates and the subsequent decision, as well as on the G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh, were the agenda will include bonuses for bank executives among other things.

Things will be fairly quiet again on the earnings front as the next earnings season has yet to ramp up. However, analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters do have high hopes for a handful of companies that will release results this week.

Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Accenture Ltd. (NYSE: ACN) beat earnings expectations but revenue was hurt by currency effects.
• Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (NASDAQ: BBBY) strong Q1 results beat estimates but same-store sales fell.
• CKE Restaurants Inc. (NYSE: CKR) lower Q1 earnings and strong sales both topped expectations.
• ConAgra Foods Inc. (NYSE: CAG) higher Q4 earnings were in line with expectations, and shares slipped.
• Darden Restaurants Inc. (NYSE: DRI) Q4 results were higher, but it warned of continuing challenges.
• Hennes & Mauritz (OTC: HMRZF) reported strong Q2 numbers, though same-stores sales slipped.

Rite Aid (NYSE: RAD), which competes with Walgreen (NYSE: WAG), CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS), and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT), saw a big increase in volume on Wednesday after it reported earnings for the first quarter. In fact, as Douglas McIntyre observed, shares of Rite Aid were up 5% at one point during yesterday's session. However, the shares ended up losing their green status by the close of trading. Rite Aid actually lost 3% when all was said and done. What does it all mean?

Well, Rite Aid did beat analyst forecasts by a wide margin. The call was for a loss of 13 cents per share. Rite Aid lost only 6 cents per share once adjustments are made. Revenues dipped a little over 1%, and same-store sales, after excluding the effect of the Brooks Eckerd acquisition, increased 1.5%. Interestingly, the mix of this increase is as follows: the pharmacy sales went up 3.1% on a comparable basis, and the non-pharmacy sales went down 1.4% on the same basis.

Today was an unusually active day for extremely volume increases in several stocks which traded on news and rumors.

Shares in Sequenom (NASDAQ: SQNM) jumped over 10% on takevover rumors.

Rite Aide (NYSE: RAD) moved higher by 5% on larger than normal volume as it beat earnings estimates and Monsanto (NYSE: MON) traded up on strong numbers and took a number of agriculture stocks with it. Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) also benefited from earnings above Wall Street forecasts.

Palm (NASDAQ: PALM) traded higher as RBC upped its price target to $18 from $14, and MEMC (NYSE: WFR) fell on a downgrade from JPMorgan.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at VSInvestor.com.

This week brings a small flurry of end-of-the-calendar-quarter earnings reports. And for the most part, the expectations of the analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters aren't very high. Companies expected to report declining earnings in the most recently concluded quarter include America's Car-Mart Inc. (NASDAQ: CRMT), Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (NASDAQ: BBBY), ConAgra Foods Inc. (NYSE: CAG), Jabil Circuit Inc. (NYSE: JBL), Jackson Hewitt Tax Service Inc. (NYSE: JTX), Monsanto Co. (NYSE: MON), and Sonic Corp. (NASDAQ: SONC).

Walgreen (NYSE: WAG), a drugstore business that competes with CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS) and Rite-Aid (NYSE: RAD), will be issuing results for the third quarter on Monday, June 22. According to Earnings.com, the analyst community is prescribing $0.56 per share for the company.

Of course, the question is: will Walgreen honor that prescription and fill it? I'd say it's quite possible. Last time around, Walgreen beat estimates. The call was for $0.66 per share in Q2. If you look at the press release from that time, you'll see that, once you adjust for some items, Walgreen went beyond expectations.

Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• American Electric Power Co. Inc. (NYSE: AEP) lowered its earnings forecast for fiscal 2009.
• Apollo Group Inc. (NASDAQ: APOL) reported better-than-expected Q2 earnings and strong revenue growth.
• Borders Group Inc. (NYSE: BGP) reported better-than-expected Q4 earnings despite a decline in sales.
• CarMax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) soaring earnings beat Q4 expectations despite a decline in revenue.
• Colgate-Palmolive Co. (NYSE: CL) was downgraded on risk to its earnings from currency issues.

Rite Aid (NYSE: RAD), whose competitors include Walgreen (NYSE: WAG), CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS), and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT), reported Q4 numbers today, and when you read through the release, you sort of come away with a decent feeling. You hear about improvements in this metric and that metric. You wonder if a turnaround might be in the offing. Then you look at the stock price and, even though it is currently being bid higher (it's up over 14% as I write), you come back down to earth and reality hits you in the face. Anything trading under a buck has to give you pause. Rite Aid is no different.

For the quarter, Rite Aid posted a 1.7% decrease in the top line. On an adjusted basis, the drugstore chain reported a loss of $0.14 per share. According to this source, Wall Street thought Rite Aid might lose $0.105 per share. The company is still adjusting to the Brooks Eckerd acquisition. Excluding that effect, same-store sales increased 0.8%. Including the asset, comps decreased 0.1%.

It seems so astonishing that it can't be true, but there are experts who believe that 25% of American retailers could fail over the course of the next year or two. According to The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), "AlixPartners LLP, a Michigan-based turnaround consulting firm, estimates that 25.8% of 182 large retailers it tracks are at significant risk of filing for bankruptcy or facing financial distress in 2009 or 2010."

If an extremely large number of retailers do close, the job loss could be incredible. Troubled retailer Pier 1 (NYSE: PIR), which trades at $0.33, has more than 6,100 employees. Rite Aid (NYSE: RAD), which also trades at $0.33, has over 60,000. If several medium-sized to large store chains move into bankruptcy, hundreds of thousands of jobs will be at stake. This does not include more modest-sized operators.

The retail industry is critical to the American economy. If it falls apart rapidly, it helps put the recession into a deeper downward spiral. Retail employees lose jobs and then are no longer consumers. With fewer consumers, more retailers and other business fail. Tax income for municipal, state, and the federal governments is also undermined, putting pressure on government employment.

The jobless rate my be close to 7% now. The retail part of the economy could move that number up quite a bit all by itself.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

Walgreen (NYSE: WAG), a major drugstore chain whose enemies include CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS) and Rite-Aid (NYSE: RAD), is getting ready to report earnings for its first fiscal quarter on Monday, December 22. It's Christmas week. Will Walgreen bestow a gift of an earnings beat upon the market?

One thing's for sure: the market does not expect much from the drugstore. Wall Street expects flat performance in Q1. The bottom line should come in somewhere around $0.46 per share, the exact same amount that was booked last year. You know, you figure the company should be able to at least match expectations when the bar is set so low. But it might be tough. We all need access to prescriptions and over-the-counter medications every now and then, and on top of that, many people obviously require long-term drug regimens. So, we can see that the pharmacy part of the equation is somewhat resistant to recession. However, there isn't a pressing need for all the non-pharmacy items in a Walgreen location. You don't need to buy any of those cheap plastic toys, any of those blenders that don't work too well, any of the overpriced groceries, etc. This is where Walgreen has exposure to the weakening consumer. Indeed, the consumer is becoming more and more of a value Grinch as time goes on. People just don't want to pay any more than they have to.