Analyst Upgrades

• Wells Fargo (WFC) to conviction buy from neutral at Goldman.
• Adobe (ADBE) to buy from neutral at UBS.
• Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) to outperform from market perform at FBR Capital.
• Vail Resorts (MTN) and Goldcorp (GG) to buy from hold at Deutsche Bank.
• OmniVision (OVTI) to overweight from neutral at JPMorgan.
• Penn Virginia (PVA) to hold from sell at Canaccord.
• Hub Group (HUBG) to outperform from market perform at Morgan Keegan.

Newspaper websites seem to be the preferred source of local news for consumers, according to the Newspaper Association of America and comScore (SCOR). Fifty-seven percent of respondents are drawn to local newspaper websites. But take this with a grain of salt: 54% chose online portals and 53% selected local television websites. In terms of what consumers consider the most trusted local news source to be, newspapers have the lead, but the gap is narrowing. Now, only 33% choose the newspaper for this reason, with local television sites pulling in 32%.

"While newspaper Web sites often face dozens of competitors touting their own local offerings in any given market, they have been able to thrive by leveraging trusted brands and strong local content to appeal to consumers and advertisers alike," John Sturm, president and CEO of the NAA, said in a statement.

Facebook is becoming a powerful force in the search engine market. It's still far behind search behemoth Google (GOOG), but the social media platform's U.S. search traffic ticked higher by 13% last month, according to data from comSore (SCOR). From 351 million search queries executed on Facebook in December, the number grew to 395 million in January.

Google still owns 65.4% of the U.S. search market, having received 14 billion search queries last month. Yahoo! (YHOO), Microsoft (MSFT), Aol (AOL) and Ask share the remainder of the market. Among these competitors, market share changed little month-over-month. So, for Facebook, this month's growth bucked the trend.

Nine catastrophe bonds have matured so far in the first quarter of 2010, removing $1.8 billion in risk-transfer capacity, according to data from Reuters. The insurance industry has compensated with $508 million in new cat bond risk capital, with the busy fourth quarter helping to absorb what is maturing now. Only one cat bond has closed so far this year, The Hartford's (HIG) $180 million Foundation Re III. But, the first quarter is usually a quiet one for the cat bond market.

It partly replaces the $105 million in protection that Foundation Re D afforded. Swiss Re (SWCEY) and SCOR (SCRYY) are also among the insurance companies with bonds maturing that have at least partial coverage from new cat bond issuances. Another four bonds have matured, however, with no new related issuance, affecting Munich Re (MURGY), AXA (AXA) and others.

The December 2009 data from comScore (SCOR) were released Tuesday, and the results for the social media sector are nothing short of staggering. Fifty-four percent (112 million) of the 205 million-strong U.S. internet-user population are on Facebook, with 27% (57 million) still using News Corp.'s (NWS) MySpace. But according to data from both comScore and Experian Hitwise (EXPN), the most active users were on Tagged, MyYearbook and Orkut. And Facebook users were more active than those on MySpace.

There's no doubt that plenty is happening in the social media space, but there are some facts that just might surprise you, either because of the speed of change or the discovery of players that may not have occurred to you.

Google (GOOG) is accustomed to being in the top spot. It leads search and virtually owns the online ad space. Its Google News portal is among the top sites for directing traffic to media outlets. But, the behemoth is starting to feel the feet from social media sensation Facebook.

Not only is the rather young platform stealing market share from Google News, it's now encroaching on its e-mail turf ... a situation that Google isn't taking lightly. To compete more effectively with Facebook, Google is upgrading its Gmail capabilities to include more social media tools reminiscent of those found on its competitor.

Long a topic of discussion, insurers and reinsurers are beginning to enter the microinsurance space. Scor (SCOR) firm invested in LeapFrog Investments, the first microinsurance fund, last month, and last week, the Microinsurance Network was launched in an effort to raise awareness of the sector.

In a mature industry, microinsurance is seen as having considerable growth potential, especially given the large numbers of people around the world who live without any form of coverage. Microinsurance protection ranges from property catastrophe to life and health. A recent study by Lloyd's of London found that 135 million people, 5% of the world's low-income people, are using microinsurance products, but that the total market size could range from 1.5 billion to 3 billion.

The catastrophe bond market is still running strong. This alternative to reinsurance, in which insurers can package up their risk and sell it to investors, may be a small part of the market, but carriers are clearly committing to it.

Swiss Re (SWCEY) and Scor (SCRYY) both have launched cat bonds, for $150 million and $75 million, respectively. This brings the fourth quarter issuance total to $840 million and the 2009 year-to-date tally to just over $2.6 billion, based on information from Artemis.bm and Guy Carpenter's GC Capital Ideas.

ComScore (NASDAQ: SCOR) is up 12% on strong earnings.

Conexant (NASDAQ: CNXT) is up 11% after reporting a good quarter.

GM (NYSE: GM) is off 7% on huge write-offs.

Biogen Idec (NASDAQ: BIIB) is off 23% on news that one of its drugs creates severe complications.

Stocks may trade differently in the pre-market than they do in the regular session.

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

Minyanville's Sean Udall dares to share the kind of keen insight and actionable information you won't find in any prospectus. Here he discusses some players in the tech sector. For more original thought, visit www.minyanville.com.

SuccessFactors (NASDAQ: SFSF): The stock prices secondary at $11.80 and is holding pretty tough. I'm watching this one pretty closely and was hoping for some post-secondary weakness to possibly add a starter here. A pretty good balance sheet just got better, but I guess the question is, "What is it going to do with that cash?"

Digital TV Holding (NYSE: STV): This company may have made a bottom recently and the deal announced today is exactly what the company talked about in its last quarterly call. I've commented on the possibility of it securing more revenue streams (partnering for recurring advertising revenue) in the past. It looks to be developing the conduits to deliver on that.

comScore (NASDAQ: SCOR): Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) news is hurting the stock badly. I sold my mine some time back after that series of paid click reports ahead of Google's last quarter that proved to be quite inaccurate. All that aside, I don't think comScore's core business is going to disappear within a compressed time frame and may be worth a long side trade if it moves near or under $20. I'll leave it be and see what develops, as the knife could cut further.

Websites are naked now and have no way to find more clothing. Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) has finally launched the much-rumored service, Trends For Websites. It measures daily unique visitors for all but the smallest internet properties.

The first reaction to the product is that it will hurt paid services like comScore (NASDAQ: SCOR), but the change Google is making runs deeper than that. No website of any kind, in any part of the industry, will be able to keep its traffic trends from its advertisers, or its competition.

As an example, traffic to msnbc.com has been rising recently. Traffic to CNN.com is not doing as well.

Democracy has hit the internet in many ways, but having a chance to keep confidential traffic data had not made it into that realm. Web publishers had some privacy about the size of their businesses. Now, that has changed, too.

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

MAJOR PAPERS:

• The Wall Street Journal's "The Game" column speculates that one of the results of the Bear Stearns crash could be the push of investment banks and commercial ones closer together, which could result in better handling of volatility with more stability. Some observers think Merrill Lynch & Co (NYSE: MER), Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) or The Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE: GS) could go that route by buying a commercial bank. Any move would force them to adhere to better reserve ratios, affect short term bank funding, and shrink balance sheets.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Google Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) will soon make available a new service that measure hits on the Internet with the intent of helping advertisers decide where to buy ads online and would directly compete with comScore Inc (NASDAQ: SCOR) and Nielsen Online. Ad executives said Google's method could make targeting markets more efficient.
• A Manhattan judge dismissed four claims made by American International Group Inc (NYSE: AIG) in its fight to regain control of a block of its shares held by Starr International, a company that once founded a lucrative compensation plan for AIG executives. AIG believes the shares held by Starr should continue to be used to fund employee compensation, the Financial Times reported.

WEB SITES:

• According to Scorpio Partnership, Bloomberg reported that UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) and Merrill Lynch had slower growth in assets under management last year due to losses connected to the U.S. subprime crisis.

At a meeting yesterday, everyone had a smartphone. It's just standard nowadays.

But whose keeping track of the metrics on these devices? Well, one of the top players is M:Metrics. This week the company agreed to sell out to comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) for $44.3 million and 50,000 stock options.

It's a savvy deal. According to the investor conference call, comScore's CEO, Dr. Magid Abraham, said that M:Metrics is a "significant" player in the space and has a three-year lead. Yes, in the topsy-turvy tech world, that's a big deal.

M:Metrics has a variety of products, with more than 180 customers. For example, MobiLens allows for a monthly online surveys of mobile phone usage from more than 40,000 users. Next, MeterDirect is an on-device meter, which is used by 4,000 users of smartphones and is compatible with 280 device models. Finally, there is M:Ad. As the name implies, this tracks mobile ads.

No doubt, mobile is going to be a big growth driver for comScore. Apparently, the revenue contribution could be 10% or more by 2009 as mentioned on the conference call.

Plus, comScore should derive some cost savings (from its well-developed infrastructure) as well as cross-sale opportunities (from its extensive product offerings). Actually, there is little customer overlap between the companies.

Wall Street seems to like the deal. In Thursday's trading, comScore's shares were up 5% to $24.68.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

There have been concerns that the rate at which people clicking on the text ads next to Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) search results has been falling. These concerns caused spirited debate before the company's last earnings report and may have even pushed the firm's stock price down. But earnings were excellent, and much of the fear went away.

Now it turns out the Google ads are doing better and better, and clicks on ads at rivals are falling. The Wall Street Journal, using comScore (NASDAQ: SCOR) data, reports that Google's performance improved in April and "Paid clicks for Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Yahoo Inc (NASDAQ:YHOO) meanwhile declined during the month, according to the data." The paper reports that Google's performance in the U.S. was 20% ahead of expectations.

Good for Google, but very bad for its two chief rivals. The information indicates that even if Microsoft buys Yahoo!, the combined operation will have a much smaller market share in search than Google, and its advertising will perform worse. If Microsoft and Yahoo! stay separate, their uphill battles could face extremely long odds.

From all the data available, Google's search technology brings back better results for consumers. Its technology for matching ads to searches also appears to work much better. The fight for the domination of this critical portion of the internet is over. The only question is whether the second and third place firms can make money long-term.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com and author of the Ten Stocks Under $10 letter.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: ComScore, Duke Realty, Nordstrom and Sun Healthcare were among today's noteworthy upgrades:

• ComScore (NASDAQ: SCOR) was upgraded to Outperform from Perform at Oppenheimer to reflect the strong Q1 report and strong customer additions.
  
• Duke Realty (NYSE: DRE) was upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Wachovia upgraded based on valuation.
  
• Nordstrom (NYSE: JWN) was upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Credit Suisse.
  
• Sun Healthcare (NASDAQ: SUNH) was upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Friedman Billings based on valuation and notes the Medicare rate cuts will be as drastic as feared.

OTHER UPGRADES:

• MedAssets (NASDAQ: MDAS) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Piper, which thinks the company's acquisition of Accuro will strengthen its revenue cycle management offering, and the firm believes the tight credit markets make the company's MedAssets a compelling product in the short-term. In addition, Piper notes that the company has recently had success with large hospital systems.
  
• Jones Apparel (NYSE: JNY) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Merrill citing sales expectations for the l.e.i. brand at Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) and margin improvements from leaner inventories.
  
• Affiliated Computer (NYSE: ACS) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Jefferies based on valuation and expectations for better bookings.