Analyst upgrades:

• JPMorgan upgraded Franklin Resources (NYSE: BEN) to Overweight from Underweight to reflect performance and sales improvements, as well as benefits from the weakening U.S. dollar. The firm has a $94 target on the stock.
• Oppenheimer upgraded FormFactor (NASDAQ: FORM) to Outperform from Perform after channel checks indicated orders are recovering. The firm raised its target on shares to $30 from $22.
• KeyBanc upgraded Oshkosh (NYSE: OSK) to Buy from Hold citing the company's MRAP-ATV contract win, which they view as a "game changer." The firm has a $30 target on the stock.
• Novellus (NASDAQ: NVLS) was upgraded to Neutral from Underperform at Credit Suisse.
• Ternium (NYSE: TX) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Goldman.
• Cathay General (NASDAQ: CATY) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at B. Riley.

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

• American Capital Agency Corp. (NASDAQ: AGNC) earnings prospects earned it an analyst's upgrade.
• Broadpoint Securities Group Inc. (NASDAQ: BPSG) earnings prospects improved with recent acquisitions.
• Clorox Co. (NYSE: CLX) was upgraded on the belief that its fiscal year outlook is too conservative.
• Deutsche Bank (NYSE: DB) earnings prospects resulted in an upgrade from JPMorgan.
• Lululemon Athletica Inc. (NASDAQ: LULU) Q1 profit and same-store sales fell and it offered a weak outlook.
• Movado Group Inc. (NYSE: MOV) bested Q1 expectations and forecast a considerable profit for the full year.

Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN), whose colleagues include Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM), Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE: AMD), and Intel (NASDAQ: INTC), gave shareholders quite a boost in morale on Monday. The chip company issued a nice outlook for the bottom line.

Here are the stats. Net sales in Q2 should come in between $2.3 billion and $2.5 billion versus the old guidance of between $1.95 billion and $2.4 billion. The bottom line should come in between 14 cents per share and 22 cents per share, versus previous estimates of between 1 cent per share and 15 cents per share.

Analyst upgrades:

• Keefe Bruyette upgraded Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) to Outperform from market Perform after transferring coverage to a new analyst. The firm expects Morgan to benefit from the pending joint venture with Smith Barney and improvements in its operating environment.
• FBR Capital upgraded Winn-Dixie (NASDAQ: WINN) to Outperform from Market Perform as it believes the company is executing well and shares are cheap at current levels. The firm keeps a $16.50 target on the stock.
• Baird believes Polaris's (NYSE: PII) consensus expectations and valuation are too low and that the company will expand beyond powersports. The firm upgraded shares to Outperform from Neutral and raised their target to $37 from $32.
• J. Crew (NYSE: JCG) was upgraded to Neutral from Sell at Goldman.
• Lexmark (NYSE: LXK) was upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight at Barclays.
• Global Hunter upgraded Big Lots (NYSE: BIG) to Buy from Neutral.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says markets are up big worldwide, and hedge funds will be scrambling to keep up.

Let's say you're a hedge fund manager. You check your screens in the morning. You look around the world. And you know what you see? Green arrows everywhere. Markets up huge: Canada up 27%, Mexico up 16%, Brazil up 62%, Hong Kong up 26%, U.K. up 10%, China up 59% and just about every Asia market up gigantically.

Oh, and the Nasdaq up 11%.

Double digits everywhere.

And you realize, "Oh boy, am I behind."

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says you may hear reasons why the rally shouldn't have occurred, but you can't deny it did happen.

On Tuesday I wanted to shoot myself, as always when I woke up and went online to see what was going on. Here's a partial list of the beautiful data points that were in my purview in the first hour of looking over the market:

1. A trenchant note from a major strategist at a bank I trust who is talking about why the market must be avoided because private-equity valuations are collapsing, so what's the point of owning equities.

This post is part of a 12-article feature on the best bets for investing in China. To see all the other recommendations in this special report, click here.

"The rollout of China's 3-G cell-phone network offers huge potential for Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM)," suggests Richard Moroney in the blue chip advisory, Dow Theory Forecasts.

"Third-generation networks offer higher download speeds for phones that browse the Internet and download songs and movies.

Those surprised by the market's strength in recent weeks should be even more impressed with the rebound in China, where both their market and economy have proven among the most resilient in the world.

Global specialist Nicholas Vardy adds, "While the US markets are rising, Asian stocks are on fire." ETF expert Paul Tracy adds, "China funds have screamed to the top of the performance charts."

In large part, this strength is due to the country's stimulus program. Tracy points out, "To combat the sagging global economy, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao orchestrated a massive 4 trillion yuan ($586 billion) stimulus package.

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

• Baidu Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU) reported better-than-expected Q1 earnings as revenues surged in the quarter.
• Burger King Holdings Inc. (NYSE: BKC) just beat Q3 expectations despite weak same-store sales growth.
• Corn Products International Inc. (NYSE: CPO) Q1 results were dragged down by higher corn costs.
• Dow Chemical Co. (NYSE: DOW) Q1 earnings sank on falling sales, job cuts and acquisition costs.
• Eastman Kodak Co. (NYSE: EK) reported a deeper-than-expected Q1 loss and suspended its dividend.
• Energizer Holdings Inc. (NYSE: ENR) posted better-than-expected Q2 earnings but revenue declined.

Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM - option chain) shares are rising today despite a weak earnings report this morning after the company agreed to pay $891 million to Broadcom (NASDAQ: BRCM) to dismiss all pending lawsuits between the two companies. The $891 settlement was not as high as the figure some analysts had feared QCOM would have had to pay BRCM. Plus, this dispute has been raging for quite some time with no end in sight, so a cessation of hostilities should be good for both companies. If you think that the stock won't fall by too much in the coming months, then now could be a good time to look at a bullish hedged trade on QCOM.

QCOM opened this morning at $42.35. So far today the stock has hit a low of $42.30 and a high of $44.59. As of 11:40, QCOM is trading at $43.78, up $2.42 (5.8%). The chart for QCOM looks bearish and S&P gives QCOM a negative 2 STARS (out of 5) sell ranking.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says Nasdaq is so strong it's downright eerie.

Tech can't be fought here. Because people are partying like it is 1999, when firms used $400 price targets for Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) (Cramer's Take) and Broadcom (NASDAQ: BRCM) (Cramer's Take) had all the wireless network answers and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) (Cramer's Take) had the audacity to think that it could control the music business.

We've seen it going on since the market bottom, the endless driving of tech higher and higher. We get the wireless bottom, thanks Nokia (NYSE: NOK) (Cramer's Take); the personal computer bottom, thanks Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) (Cramer's Take); the gadget bottom, thanks Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE: TSM) (Cramer's Take); the TV bottom, thanks Corning (NYSE: GLW) (Cramer's Take) and Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) (Cramer's Take); the software bottom, thanks to Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) (Cramer's Take) buying Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) (Cramer's Take) for its software and IBM (NYSE: IBM) (Cramer's Take) celebrating its software on its quarter; and the dot-com bottom represented by great earnings from Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) (Cramer's Take) and decent numbers from rejuvenated management teams at Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) (Cramer's Take) and eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) (Cramer's Take).

Analyst upgrades:

• Jefferies upgraded Brocade (NASDAQ: BRCD) to Buy from Hold on expectations expanding OEM partnerships, new products and entry into new markets will drive long-term growth. The firm's channel checks indicate the first phase of an IBM (NYSE: IBM) deal for ethernet products will be announced next week. Jefferies raised its target price on the stock to $6 from $3.50.
  
• JMP Securities upgraded Broadcom (NASDAQ: BRCM) to Market Perform from Underperform citing the potential settlement with Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM). The firm said Broadcom has far more to gain than Qualcomm has to lose.
  
• Citigroup upgraded Air Products (NYSE: APD) and Praxair (NYSE: PX) to Buy from Hold on expectations that an improvement in customer operating rates will benefit gas companies. The firm raised its target price on Air Products to $70 from $55 and on Praxair to $79 from $63.
  
• Royal Bank of Scotland upgraded BP Plc (NYSE: BP) to Buy from Hold to reflect its dividend yield at current levels.
• Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) was raised to Outperform from Underperform at RBC Capital.
  
• T. Rowe Price (NYSE: TROW) was upgraded at Sandler O'Neill to Hold from Sell.
  
• Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) was lifted to Neutral from Underperform at Banc of America/Merrill.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says if you don't want to wait for a pullback, look abroad for the next leg or find values at home.

What do you do when everyone knows we have come up too far, too fast; no one knows who is actually buying; and we are going into earnings season?

What do you do when the animal spirits are taking up the market and yet other than a handful companies -- Research In Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM) (Cramer's Take), Xilinx (NASDAQ: XLNX) (Cramer's Take), Corning (NYSE: GLW) (Cramer's Take), Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) (Cramer's Take) and Taiwan Semi (NYSE: TSM) (Cramer's Take) -- almost all companies that have spoken during the "off-season" earnings reports have been dismal?

In January, I posted on netbooks -- paperback book-sized computers that now go for under $300. To me, the netbook looked like a powerful growth trend that was boosting sales at makers by as much as 55%, even as the rest of the PC industry shrank 12%. 11 million netbooks were sold in 2008 and 22 million are expected to fly off the shelves in 2009.

Netbooks are popular because many people spend a lot of time dealing with online services and want a cheap, light device they can use on the go.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says this market is short-term overbought -- any other reasons to buy can wait.

The playbook says, "Buy weak-dollar plays." But does that mean only weak-dollar commodity plays, as in flee-out-of-dollar-into-oil plays? Or weak-dollar plays like Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) (Cramer's Take) and General Mills (NYSE: GIS) (Cramer's Take)? Or weak-dollar plays like gold? Or tech plays because Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) (Cramer's Take) and Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) (Cramer's Take) are hugely international?

Or do you bother doing anything at all up here because we are plus-seven on the oscillator and every time we have gotten this overbought in this market, we have come crashing down?