TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says if the market made sense, you could buy retail and restaurants off the lower oil price.

Here's the pattern: We get shelled by oil. It drops to $76 or $77, all energy goes down, and it takes everything else with it. Some of tech has been spared lately because of 3Com (COMS) (Cramer's Take).

Then, in the following couple of days, oil stabilizes (but not after it hurts the oils again), rallies, and everything goes with it.

That's what's been occurring. I don't know why it's any different. In this moment in time, it's often best to buy the most hammered natural gas stocks because they come back fast. The best value is Devon (DVN) (Cramer's Take), but it simply isn't down enough. Apache (APA) (Cramer's Take) would make sense below $60, which is still a ways from here.

The U.S. dollar continues to show weakness, and oil will likely continue to be a good hedge against its further deterioration.

Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA), which is a large oil and natural gas exploration and production company, should continue to benefit from the dollar's fall.

APA fell from almost $150 in May 2008, to $51 in March. Energy prices improved, and so did this stock as it built a base on a double cup-and-handle formation.

When selecting which stocks to buy, ratings from agencies like Standard & Poor's can be useful in creating a balanced portfolio.

But did you know technical analysis is the most accurate way to predict where a stock -- or the market for that matter -- is going?

Technical analysis is more of an art than a science, but when used correctly it can boost your profits to new heights. I took a look at stocks that S&P has a four- or five-star rating on and analyzed their charts to come up with six great technical trades for you.

Among all the negative economic data that came out last week was a positive surprise: retail sales were higher in January. A fluke or a glimmer at the end of the tunnel? That may depend on whether we see any positive surprises arising from items on this week's economic calendar:

• Consumer Analyst Group of New York Conference: Monday through Friday
• NY Empire Manufacturing Index (Feb. 2009): Tuesday, 8:30 AM
• NAHB Housing Market Index (Feb. 2009): Tuesday, 1:00 PM
• Fed's Bullard speaks before National Association of Business Economists: Tuesday, 1:00 PM
• Housing starts (Jan. 2009): Wednesday, 8:30 AM
• Fed's Pianalto speaks before Commercial Developers Power Breakfast: Wednesday, 9:00 AM
• Industrial production (Jan. 2009): Wednesday, 9:15 AM
• Fed's Bernanke speaks before National Press Club Luncheon: Wednesday, 12:30 PM

While other earnings may have disappointed last week, the news was good for oil giant ConocoPhilips (NYSE: COP). In what some took as a good sign for big oil, the Houston-based company reported that third quarter net income surged 41% year over year to $3.39 per share, and that revenue also surged 52% to $70 billion. We'll see whether the good news extends to other petroleum giants scheduled to report quarterly results this week.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial are looking for BP (NYSE: BP) profits to have grown 43.2% in the most recent quarter to $2.34 per share on revenue of $109.7 billion, and Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) to post earnings up 39.4% to $3.25 per share on revenue of $86.8 billion. Marathon Oil Corp. (NYSE: MRO), ExxonMobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), and Royal Dutch Shell (NYSE: RDS.A) likewise are expected to report higher net income of $2.33 per share (sales of $23.4 billion), $2.40 per share (sales of $131.4 billion), and $2.65 per share, respectively. Even Valero Energy Corp. (NYSE: VLO) is expected to post earnings slightly higher to $1.46 per share (sales of $36.4 billion), despite the effects of Hurricane Ike. Among these companies, only BP and Valero beat earnings expectations in the previous quarter. Not surprisingly, analysts on average recommend buying all except Valero, and shares of all of these companies have recently hit 52-week lows.

So the earnings crunch continues, and here's a look at some companies scheduled to report results this week that are anticipated to be big winners and losers in terms of earnings growth.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial expect the following to report strong earnings growth when compared to the same period of the previous year.

• Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA): $4.10 EPS (+53.9%) on revenue of $3.8 billion (+54.6%)
• EOG Resources Inc. (NYSE: EOG): $2.34 EPS (+50.0%) on revenue of $1.7 billion (+62.2%)
• Avon Products Inc. (NYSE: AVP): $0.47 EPS (+44.7%) on revenue of $2.6 billion (+11.5%)
• Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. (NYSE: GT): $0.62 EPS (+43.5%) on revenue of $5.3 billion (+7.0%)
• Hess Corp. (NYSE: HES): $2.76 EPS (+38.4%) on revenue of $8.3 billion (+14.6%)
• Murphy Oil Corp. (NYSE: MUR): $2.19 EPS (+35.2%) on revenue of $7.8 billion (+126.2%)
• Noble Energy Inc. (NYSE: NBL): $2.08 EPS (+34.6%) on revenue of $1.0 billion (+40.1%)
• U.S. Steel Corp. (NYSE: X): $3.91 EPS (+32.0%) on revenue of $5.9 billion (+39.6%)
• Corning Inc. (NYSE: GLW): $0.49 EPS (+30.6%) on revenue of $1.7 billion (+21.3%)
• Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM): $2.52 EPS (+27.4%) on revenue of $144.4 billion (+46.8%)

Clearly expectations are high for oil and energy. Other companies expected to report double-digit earnings growth include Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX), CVS Caremark Corp. (NYSE: CVS), NYSE Euronext Inc. (NYSE: NYX), Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ), and Aetna Inc. (NYSE: AET).

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

• Allegiant Travel Co. (NASDAQ: ALGT) beat estimates with soaring Q1 revenues, bucking the airline trend.
• Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA) Q1 profits doubled but fell short of expectations.
• Avon Products Inc. (NYSE: AVP) posted solid Q1 results despite negative operational cash flow.
• Centex Corp. (NYSE: CTX) posted a Q4 loss well below analyst estimates.
• Cigna Corp. (NYSE: CI) profits plunged in the first quarter on litigation charges.
• Countrywide Financial Corp. (NYSE: CFC) posted another big loss, way off estimates of a small profit.
• Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE: DB) posted its first quarterly loss since 2003 on write-downs.
• Gardner Denver Inc. (NYSE: GDI) beat Q1 expectations and raised its outlook for the year.
• International Paper Co. (NYSE: IP) fell short of Wall Street's Q1 earnings estimates.
• Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. (NYSE: JEC) beat Q1 estimates and offered fully-year guidance.
• KBR Inc. (NYSE: KBR) Q1 profit more than doubled on arbitration benefit.
• MasterCard Inc. (NYSE: MA) topped analysts' expectations as Q1 profits more than doubled.
• Office Depot Inc. (NYSE: ODP) Q1 profits tumbled 55% but still beat analysts' estimates.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says it's not a strong-dollar sell -- the story here is still too good.

Why did natural gas go down last week? What was that? Inventories were down. The commodity price was up. The fuel itself is green. It is better than ethanol and it is being used to fuel an increasing numbers of cars and trucks.

The whole move down had to have been triggered by something, right? Yeah, how about the fact that the stocks were up a lot and were due for some profit-taking.

Recall that the real "reason" they went down is that the dollar "got strong," and that was supposed to trigger commodity deflation; natural gas is a commodity and is therefore going to go down. (Barron's made this very case this weekend, oblivious to the facts, but loving the theory.)

This kind of thinking is just so stupid that it shows you can get chance after chance after chance to own the fuel that can take care of the nation if we just let it. Of course, the stocks began to come back later in the week as threats of supply cut-offs of crude -- they came true this weekend -- made natural gas declines virtually impossible, despite the "sense" that it peaked. So the money has came back and I believe will continue to come back.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Energy companies, Regulated and Diversified Utilities and Tailsman Energy were today's noteworthy upgrades:

• Bernstein raised its 2008 oil forecast to $92.30/bbl, up 27%, and 2008 natural gas forecast to $8.30/mcf, up 7%. By 2012, the firm expects oil prices to be around $86/bbl and for gas to be $9.2/mcf. The firm upgraded Apache Corp (NYSE: APA) and XTO Energy (NYSE: XTO) to Outperform from Market Perform and EnCana (NYSE: ECA) to Market Perform from Underperform.
  
• Goldman upgraded the Regulated and Diversified Utilities sub-sectors to Attractive from Neutral citing expected economic weakness, positive commodity exposure, and earnings growth. The firm upgraded American Electric Power (NYSE: AEP) to Buy from Neutral.
  
• Citigroup upgraded shares of Tailsman Energy (NYSE: TLM) to Buy from Hold ahead of the company's annual meeting as they believe it will announce a new strategy of low risk resource development on existing acreage and that shares will react positively.

OTHER UPGRADES:

• UBS raised Watson Wyatt (NYSE: WW) to Buy from Neutral.
  
• Jefferies upgraded Clear Channel Outdoors (NYSE: CCO) to Buy from Hold.
  
• Bear upgraded Telecom Italia (NYSE: TI) to Peer Perform from Underperform.

Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA), an oil and gas exploration and development company, is recently trading at $115.10. Crude oil futures are at $104.10, up 4.60% according to Bloomberg. APA over all option implied volatility of 38 is above its 26-week average of 34 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price movements.

Option Update is provided by Stock Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com.

This would seem to be a hard day to find stocks hitting new highs, but some industries produced winners.

Silver Wheaton Corp. (NYSE: SLW): It was a good day for metals stocks. This one ran up to $19.16 against a 52-week low of $8.83.

Southwestern Energy Company (NYSE: SWN): It was a good day for energy stocks. SWN moved higher to $58.63 from 52-week low of $31.14.

Peabody Energy Corporation (NYSE: BTU): This coal company traded up to $63.97 from 52-week low of $36.20.

Apache Corporation (NYSE: APA): This oil and natural gas operator hit $111.78 compared to 52-week low of $63.01.

Akeena Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKNS): This company licensed technology to Suntech Power Holdings Co., Ltd.(ADR) (NYSE: STP). It moved to $11.99 from 52-week low of $2.97.

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

Just call Apache a buying opportunity extraordinaire. Oil/gas exploration and development company Apache (NYSE: APA) has dipped about $10 from 52-week highs around $107.50 to about $97, due to oil's recent pull-back.

As a result, APA's p/e is down to about 15. A p/e of 15 may not seem that cheap, but given Apache's upside potential -- it is. Look for Apache to continue to achieve solid growth through internal investment and acquisitions. Apache has several key exploration discoveries set to enter development stage and will drill nine wells in Canada this winter as part of its oil shale operations.

Overall, analysts see Apache's oil and gas volumes increasing about 10%-12% in 2007 and 2008. Even better: the company believes it can generate double-digit production growth for the next decade. The Reuters F2007/F2008 EPS consensus estimates for APA are $7.54/$8.84.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says you have to be bullish on the commodity when we're using more of it than ever, it's running out and $100 a barrel doesn't even sound crazy anymore.

Can you trust the International Energy Agency to be right about how oil demand will be blunted by high prices and how consumption will decline?

First, let's deal with demand. I haven't seen any slowing in demand in any of the indicators I use, in part because gasoline hasn't kept pace with the commodity. Cars, certainly, haven't made any strides in using less gasoline, and news right now out of Ford (NYSE: F) (Cramer's Take) is that there's really been no progress whatsoever.

How about heating demand? I have seen no switch whatsoever to another fuel because of the rise. Not one bit, or you would see a nat gas rally.

How about power plant demand? I am willing to think that some power plant manufacturers will debate switching, but building a new coal plant is something no one feels comfortable with without new standards. Nothing's happened along these lines, though.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: GlobalSantaFe Corp, Transocean, Frontier Oil, Tesoro and Audio Codes were today's noteworthy upgrades:

• JP Morgan upgraded shares of GlobalSantaFe Corporation (NYSE: GSF) and Transocean Inc (NYSE: RIG) to Neutral from Underweight based on valuation and improving deepwater rig fundamentals.
  
• Frontier Oil Corporation (NYSE: FTO) was upgraded at Banc of America to Buy from Neutral as they believe the company's assets are ideally located to access cheap Canadian oil sands production. They feel the stock should trade closer to its replacement value, which they estimate at $55/share.
  
• The firm also raised Tesora Corporation (NYSE: TSO) to Buy from Neutral, as the firm believes Terero is the best play on the extended refining cycle given its exposure to California.
  
• CIBC upgraded shares of AudioCodes (NASDAQ: AUDC) to Sector Outperformer from Sector Performer on valuation after their checks suggested the company's business is stabilizing and cost cutting is tracking ahead of plan, which could bring upside EPS estimates.

OTHER UPGRADES:

• GSI Commerce (NASDAQ: GSIC) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Jefferies.
  
• Apache Corporation (NYSE: APA) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Goldman Sachs.
  
• Amgen Inc (NASDAQ: AMGN) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Merrill Lynch.
  
• BB&T Capital upgraded shares of Skechers USA (NYSE: SKX) to Buy from Hold.
  
• Bernstein upgraded shares of Cognizant Technology (NASDAQ: CTSH) to Outperform from Market Perform.

This ought to please the ad wizards in Redmond-based Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT). In two separate surveys recently, the results showed that Microsoft's Internet Information Server (IIS) product was growing faster than one of the world's most popular web server software systems -- the open source Apache Server that runs on the free Linux operating system. Maybe we'll see Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer do another monkey dance soon.

Is this a celebration moment for Microsoftites? Possibly. NetCraft found that Microsoft's IIS was steadily gaining in popularity as a web-serving platform across the globe, and Port80 found that IIS was beating the free Apache web serving platform among enterprise systems in corporate America. Microsoft's web-serving systems have been around for quite some time, but have never been as popular as some of the competition (and Apache doesn't even cost anything).

Is Microsoft finally becoming a threat to open-source software at the computer server level? These surveys would seem to indicate that, although a few surveys in one year doesn't make an airtight case at all. There are also many things about the DIY nature of open-source computer systems that make survey results difficult to tabulate into meaningful data. Still, survey facts don't lie: Microsoft's IIS saw usage on 36.2% of all active web sites at the same time that Apache lost nearly a million web site names (dropping to a 48.4% market share).

[Disclosure: I own MSFT shares as of 8-24-07]