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.

McDermott International (NYSE: MDR) is a global oil engineering and construction company that specializes in offshore oil and gas construction and power generation systems.

Although more diversified than pure oil plays, McDermott has benefited greatly from the increase in price in crude.

The speculation is that McDermott will be quite busy with construction projects, as drillers are more active with the higher prices.

You have to love OPEC. It's not uncommon for the barons of the giant cartel to voice their interest in seeing oil at such-and-such a price.

Recently, OPEC reiterated its desire to see oil prices at $80 per barrel. This, they claim, is the price needed to spur additional investment in crude projects. Apparently, anything less will result in oil sitting idle in the ground.

Analyst upgrades:

• Merriman upgraded Taser (NASDAQ: TASR) to Buy from Neutral as it believes current valuation levels do not reflect the company's market opportunities and that the law enforcement funding in President Obama's stimulus plan will boost sales in Q4 and FY10.
  
• Goldman upgraded Macy's (NYSE: M) to Buy from Neutral and added shares to its Conviction Buy List based on reduced balance sheet concerns and improved risk/reward. The firm also raised their target to $8.25 from $8.
  
• JP Morgan upgraded Family Dollar (NYSE: FDO) to Neutral from Underweight and raised its target to $29 from $19 following the better-than-expected Q2 report. The analyst continues to prefer Dollar Tree (NASDAQ: DLTR) and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT).
• Goldman removed Universal Am (NYSE: UAM) from the Conviction Sell List.
  
• McDermott (NYSE: MDR) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Jefferies.
  
• Canadian Natural (NYSE: CNQ) was upgraded to Sector Outperformer from Sector Performer at CIBC.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says eventually, the credit markets will thaw, and this one will take off like a rocket.

Cheap isn't always relative. Consider the case of Shaw Group (NYSE: SGR) (Cramer's Take), the infrastructure play with the nuclear bent that has tons of business around the world building nuke plants that are competitive with oil and nat gas even at these prices, but obviously are much better for the environment.

Shaw's doing great -- big order book, no cancellations or stretch-outs (unlike ABB (NYSE: ABB) (Cramer's Take) or McDermott (NYSE: MDR) (Cramer's Take)), and most important, its stock is trading a mere dollar and a half above its cash.

It's absurd, as the CEO told me last night on a pre-empted edition of the 6 p.m. "Mad Money." The valuation makes no sense.

This post was written by Minyanville contributor Sean Udall.

Through my career I've generally stayed apolitical with regard to investment and trading decisions, but there have been times when some higher percentage trades have presented themselves due to political circumstances. Examples include: the tech push in Clinton's second term, the defense sector after Bush's 2000 victory, as well as the oil patch. Based on that, here are some overriding thoughts, in no particular order.

The market has moved to the phase where many if not most participants want and expect a pullback. Since the market confounds the greatest number of players most of the time, is a big pullback a lower probability event now? Moreover, does the selling panic of much of October turn into a buying panic in the coming weeks and months? I'm letting the charts lead me here but aware that this bullish case could possibly trump terrible economic conditions.

I still think the alt energy patch (solar, wind, battery tech, clean coal) will produce some of the best winners, but a lot of easy money has been made in just days. Quality and fundamentals will likely count much more now than over the past few months. Also, extended runs may become vulnerable quickly if policy decisions do not show quick tangible follow-through. Companies with the best balance sheets and funding sources will benefit the most and have the least downside on sharp technical pullbacks.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the sellers are in control, and without dividend protection, we have no floor.

The bad stuff is in the market. It just has to get more in. That's all. That's the conclusion you have to reach when you see companies like Terex (NYSE: TEX) (Cramer's Take), which is valued at only a billion and a half dollars, or Joy Global (NASDAQ: JOYG) (Cramer's Take) at $2 billion and change or McDermott (NYSE: MDR) (Cramer's Take) at $3 billion.

In other words, forget about the stock prices. They are almost all absurd unless we are headed into a recession of such magnitude that companies start showing severe losses in the first quarter. Think about the market cap size. If Terex, which is actually a pretty good machinery company, can sell at a billion and a half dollars -- about the price that some acquisitive company might have paid for a division of Terex a year ago -- why can't it sell at $1 billion? How about $800 million? What's to stop it? The sellers at this point obviously don't even care about it, not one bit. They just want money. The buyers have had their heads twisted off and don't want anything more to do with it. No one wants to recommend it because the estimates are too high. And without a dividend, it has no protection; besides, people might perceive that the dividend can't be paid -- a la Freeport (NYSE: FCX) (Cramer's Take) -- and sell it anyway.

Analyst upgrades:

• Merrill upgraded shares of General Motors (NYSE: GM) and Ford (NYSE: F) to Neutral from Underperform on expectations for fundamentals to improve in 2009.
  
• Citigroup upgraded Chubb (NYSE: CB) and Travelers Group (NYSE: TRV) to Buy from Hold as they expect the company to benefit from the AIG (NYSE: AIG) fallout. The firm raised Chubb's target to $57 from $56 and Travelers Group's target to $51.50 from $49.50.
  
• Credit Suisse upgraded shares of SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) to Outperform from Neutral as they believe margin expansion can drive higher profitability.
• JetBlue (NASDAQ: JBLU) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Argus.
• Goldman raised Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) to Neutral from Sell.
  
• NetLogic (NASDAQ: NETL) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Piper.

Analyst downgrades:

• JP Morgan downgraded Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY) to Underweight from Neutral citing the company's early stage pipeline and generic competition.
  
• Merrill downgraded Unilever (NYSE: UL) to Neutral from Buy as they believe the incoming CEO is unlikely to bring a major restructuring or split up the company.

Merrill Lynch downgraded Credit Suisse (NYSE:CS) to Underpeform from Neutral, according to MarketWatch.

Deutsche Bank downgraded China Netcom (NYSE:CN) to Hold from Buy, according to Briefing.com. The news services also reports that Citigroup downgraded McDermott (NYSE:MDR) to Hold from Buy.

Citigroup (NYSE:C) was cut to Underperform from Neutral at Merrill Lynch, according to 24/7 Wall St. The financial website also reports that Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) was cut to Underperform from Buy at Merrill Lynch.

Douglas A. McIntyre

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Evergreen Solar, Myriad Genetics and Columbia Laboratories were today's noteworthy initiations:

• Kaufman Bros. believes Evergreen Solar (NASDAQ: ESLR) is well-positioned to take advantage of a decline in raw material costs because it makes its own wafers on its own equipment. The firm started shares with a Buy rating and $18 target.
  
• Myriad Genetics (NASDAQ: MYGN) was initiated at RBC Capital with an Underperform rating and $37 target and expects negative Phase III results for Flurizan when data is presented in June.
  
• Caris believes Columbia Laboratories (NASDAQ: CBRX) has two potential high value treatments, one to prevent preterm birth and the other to treat primary dysmenorrhea. Shares were initiated with a Buy rating and $11 target.

OTHER INITIATIONS:

• McDermott (NYSE: MDR) was initiated with a Buy rating and $70 target at KeyBanc.
  
• Morgan Stanley assumed Canon (NYSE: CAJ) with an Overweight rating.
  
• Polaris Industries (NYSE: PII) was initiated at William Blair with a Market Perform rating.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says this report highlighted where the success lies in this market: energy and petroleum.

Fluor's (NYSE: FLR) (Cramer's Take) a monster. It shows you that what has hurt the other companies, particularly Chicago Bridge & Iron (NYSE: CBI) (Cramer's Take), is pure execution.

This gigantic beat also serves to remind us of the big dichotomy. You are either in the energy and petroleum products game or you are in a lot of games that don't work.

It's not easy for these companies, some of which have lived off the duress of state and local governments, including Shaw (NYSE: SGR) (Cramer's Take) and to a certain extent Aecom (NYSE: ACM) (Cramer's Take) and URS (NYSE: URS) (Cramer's Take), to become oil-and-gas plays.

The only ones that have transcended it beside Fluor are Foster Wheeler (NASDAQ: FWLT) (Cramer's Take) and Jacobs Engineering (NYSE: JEC) (Cramer's Take), and the only reason you would really know that is longevity. I remember in the early 1980s when FLR and then FWC would compete directly for all of the huge projects after the second oil shock.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Fluor, Forward Air and McDermott were today's noteworthy upgrades:

• Citigroup upgraded shares of Fluor (NYSE: FLR) to Buy from Hold to reflect the company's strong performance and backlog in Q4 and raised their target to $190.50 from $158.
  
• Baird upgraded Forward Air (NASDAQ: FWRD) to Outperform from Neutral citing near-term growth initiatives that are gaining traction.
  
• Citigroup also upgraded shares of McDermott (NYSE: MDR) to Buy from Hold to reflect the company's strong Q4 performance and rising commodity prices.

OTHER UPGRADES:

• RBC Capital upgraded Digital Realty (NYSE: DLR) and ProLogis (NYSE: PLD) to Top Pick from Outperform.
  
• Credit Suisse raised China Unicom (NYSE: CHU) to Outperform from Neutral.
  
• Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN) and Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) were upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Merrill Lynch.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says without more cuts, more bleak days and a reversion to 1990 are ahead.

Yeah, you don't need me to know it is bad. Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) (Cramer's Take) said the wrong thing about financial services Wednesday night, certainly off message for Mr. Chambers. It would be one thing if the stock hadn't run, it has. Now it must go lower, even though it really wasn't that bad. It had been gunned, though, and everyone I know is hiding in tech.

I didn't like the revenue number from McDermott (NYSE: MDR) (Cramer's Take), and that's going to hurt the infra group. Someone's going to say that MDR could be the beginning of the end of the Shaw (NYSE: SGR)/Foster-Wheeler (NASDAQ: FWLT) move.

But in the end, it is the same thing it always is: mortgages. AIG (NYSE AIG) (Cramer's Take), after the bell Wednesday, is a black hole. Who the heck knows what they really have? Maybe they will even tell us.

Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) (Cramer's Take) wasn't any worse than the papers hinted, but they said it would get worse. Thanks!

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says names in these two sectors now represent very little value and a lot of momentum, so know why you're buying them.

So many times last week I wanted to write about how some stocks just can't possibly go higher.

I thought that would be the case with these amazing levitators in agriculture. But then I listened to the Mosaic (NYSE: MOS) (Cramer's Take) conference call and was shocked into believing that the group simply isn't done because of the severe planting shortfalls vs. demands for next year for virtually every kind of crop.

I felt that same way when infrastructure exploded upward after Shaw (NYSE: SGR) (Cramer's Take) reported. But then I listened to that call and I heard that there are more than a trillion dollars' worth of projects out there, and the companies that have a shot at getting all this business tend to be $12 billion and smaller, and that really is just a mad-cap stock.

You see, there are simply not enough ag and infra plays around to participate, so you get this whoosh up in Deere (NYSE: DE) (Cramer's Take), Monsanto (NYSE: MON) (Cramer's Take), Bunge (NYSE: BG) (Cramer's Take), Mosaic and Agrium (NYSE: AGU) (Cramer's Take) every time something good happens.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer is amazed by some stocks that just won't quit and looks at the practicalities of getting into these winners.

Starting to get startling disparities between the haves and the have-nots.

Can we have a day where Syngenta (NYSE: SYT) (Cramer's Take) and Monsanto (NYSE: MON) (Cramer's Take) don't go up, let alone Deere (NYSE: DE) (Cramer's Take) and Bunge (NYSE: BG) (Cramer's Take)?

Can we have a breather in which Fluor (NYSE: FLR) (Cramer's Take) and Shaw Group (NYSE: SGR) (Cramer's Take) don't run higher, or Foster Wheeler (NASDAQ: FWLT) (Cramer's Take) and McDermott (NYSE: MDR) (Cramer's Take)?

And can we have a two-day period when a Masco (NYSE: MAS) (Cramer's Take) or a JPMorgan (NYSE: JPM) (Cramer's Take) can go higher?

Can we have more than a short-squeeze streak by a retailer?