PepsiCo Inc. (PEP) is slated to take its turn on the earnings stage tomorrow morning, with Wall Street expecting the sultan of snack foods to report a third-quarter profit of $1.22 per share -- up from $1.08 per share in the year-ago period. PEP has a solid history on the earnings front, having exceeded analysts' consensus profit expectations in three of the past four quarters.

However, speculative investors seem skittish ahead of the event. During the past 10 days, options traders on the International Securities Exchange (ISE) have bought to open 1.59 puts for every call on PEP. This ratio ranks higher than 84% of other such readings taken during the previous year, marking a near-peak of pessimistically slanted option volume on the exchange.

The Old Grey Lady is ailing. Wednesday morning, New York Times Co. (NYT) warned that its third-quarter revenue will decline by a wider-than-expected margin, due to slower growth in digital advertising. Speaking at an investor conference in New York, CEO Janet Robinson explained that digital ad revenue is expected to rise about 14%, compared to its earlier forecast for growth in the mid-to-high teens.

As a result, the company expects to swallow a third-quarter operating loss of 5 cents to 7 cents per share. Excluding items, earnings are expected to arrive at 3 cents to 5 cents per share, compared to Wall Street's consensus estimate of 4 cents per share.

Hovnanian Enterprises (HOV) is scheduled to take the earnings stage after Wednesday's closing bell, with Wall Street expecting the homebuilder to report a fiscal third-quarter loss of 52 cents per share. This would mark a notable improvement over Hovnanian's year-ago loss of $2.16 per share, but there's no guarantee the company can match analysts' expectations. During the past four quarters, Hovnanian has fallen short of consensus earnings estimates on two occasions.

Accordingly, speculators have been loading up on bearish bets as Hovnanian's quarterly report approaches. The International Securities Exchange (ISE) reports that traders have bought to open 4.64 puts for every call on HOV during the past 10 days, revealing a strong bias toward pessimistically oriented options.

Bearish sentiment is nearly palpable as Toll Brothers (TOL) prepares to unveil its fiscal third-quarter results. Ahead of the open on Wednesday, Toll Brothers is expected to report a quarterly loss of 14 cents per share -- significantly improved from the homebuilder's year-ago deficit of $2.93 per share.

The company has a dismal track record in the earnings spotlight though, having fallen short of Wall Street's consensus expectations in three of the past four reporting periods. And, judging by recent increases in short interest and buy-to-open put volume, traders are bracing for another disappointing report from Toll Brothers.

Marvell Technology Group (MRVL) is scheduled to take the earnings stage after the closing bell. Ahead of the tech company's fiscal third-quarter report, analysts are anticipating a profit of 27 cents per share, up from its year-ago net income of 23 cents per share. Sales for the quarter are expected to total $770 million.

If history is any guide, Marvell could very well exceed these consensus estimates. During the past four reporting periods, the company has consistently met or surpassed analysts' earnings expectations.

The market was able to stage a late day rally which erased some of its earlier losses, but still ended the day in the red, with all 3 major indexes closing down on the day.

September is typically not a good month for the market, but even with today's losses this September was positive, as more and more investors have started to believe the economy is coming out of its recession.

Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL) was on the upswing Monday after the firm raised its forecast for third-quarter margins. The airline issue now expects operating margin of 3% to 4% for the current quarter, compared to its midsummer outlook of 1% to 3%. Third-quarter fuel prices are now expected to average $2.14 per gallon, down from a prior prediction of $2.17.

The update comes courtesy of a regulatory filing, wherein Delta noted that many of its financial metrics are improving on both a sequential and a year-over-year basis. Load factor for September and October is pegged at 82%, narrowly above last year's level. Meanwhile, revenue per available seat mile is expected to decline in the third quarter, but less so than in the second quarter.

Long-time investors in Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX) have not had a great ride over the past 24 months, in which the stock tumbled to a several-year low, hitting bottom in November 2008 at $7.06. It's a far cry from the growth stock dreams of 2006, where the stock regularly scored in the upper $30s. Today's close, $14.69, is more than double that day in November; but still many investors are likely below water. And while the third quarter 2009 results won't push the stock back toward its 2006 highs, at the very least, it's cracking $16 in after-hours trading.

Like any vendor-of- unnecessary-luxuries in a recession-type era, Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX) hasn't been doing swimmingly this year. The company's stock is 27.7% since its January 2nd open of $20.14; the second fiscal quarter results showed declining same-store sales; and the company's founding CEO fired his replacement and took the company back over. Furthermore, yesterday marked announcements of dozens of store closings in Australia and the layoffs of about 1,000 nonstore employees.

It may not be a good time to be a Starbucks investor. The company reports fiscal third quarter earnings after market close today. Analysts expect Starbucks to have earnings growth despite the setbacks; they are projecting earnings of 18.3 cents a share on revenues of $2.6 billion, according to Thompson. My best guess, though, is that the same-store sales will decline further and that Schultz will attempt to bury the disappointment with promises of a streamlined, more open company and more efficient operations in the next quarter. With all the closings set to occur over the next few months, it's likely that efficiencies won't be recognized until the next fiscal year. Just how patient are Starbucks investors?

The stock was down today 28 cents, or 1.87%, to $14.71 a few minutes before market close.

When big cuts precede the announcement of quarterly earnings, I can't help but expect bad things in the earnings release. Today's twin announcements by Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX); first, that the company is shuttering most of its 84 Australia stores due to "challenges unique to the Australian market"; and second, that the company was cutting about 1,000 nonstore jobs; surely make it a likelihood that the fiscal third quarter was not pretty. There was not an estimate of the total job to be cut between Australian store closings, the 600 U.S. closings, the previously-announced reduction in headquarters staff and today's announcement; but it must total several thousand.

Starbucks hasn't offered any guidance for the quarter, but analyst consensus is that the company will earn profit of 18 cents a share on revenue of $2.62 billion. Analysts seem to agree that Starbucks' same-store sales, which declined in the fiscal second quarter, will decline further ("mid-single digits" according to Robert W. Baird analyst David Tarantino).

The fact that Starbucks is laying off thousands and shuttering hundreds of stores tells me the company is cleaning house in a big way due to startlingly poor results; but will investors be pleased or pessimistic about the company's now-slimmer future?

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) got the business day off to rollicking start reporting an 11.5% jump in third-quarter profits. Net income was $2.65 billion, or 63 cents a share, which met analysts' expectations. Sales increased 12% from a year ago to $83.5 billion.

The stock closed yesterday at $46.32 and in pre-market trading as of 7:15 am was up to $46.75. We'll see where the stock is by the end of the conference call, which is scheduled to start at 7:30 a.m. ET.

7:30 a.m.: Lee Scott, president and CEO, says "although pleased" with results, sales were "softer than hoped." He went over the numbers in the press release. Looking ahead, he promised the most aggressive pricing ever for the holidays in toys and electronics.

"You'll hear the word Christmas," in stores and in advertising, he promised.

This month Wal-Mart is opening 21 stores in U.S. "just in time for holiday shopping," he says. Now he's going over jobs created at new superstores.

In international, he promises a "bright future." New stores in Mexico are doing well and Canada superstores are open. Meantime, the company has exited South Korea and Germany. India is developing.

Next year Wal-Mart will open 60 million square feet of retail space in 600 new locations, says Scott. That's slightly less square footage growth. He promises to make the most "efficient use of capital." He highlights efforts to control "capital expenditures."

Now he's crowing about the $4 generic drug program Wal-Mart launched recently, along with other ways Wal-Mart has "contributed to society" -- "not just in the U.S., but around the world."

7:42 a.m: CFO Tom Schoewe is going over the financials in more depth. He points out that "if we remove all the noise in the numbers," Wal-Mart gross margins would have increased. That is despite transportation cost increases.

In breaking after-market-close results, International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM)'s third-quarter earnings were up 47% with a 5.1% increase in sales to $22.62 billion; a huge bit of good news for Big Blue.

On the other side of the coin was Motorola, Inc. (NYSE:MOT). Oh, how the mighty mobile company has fallen. Third quarter 2006 earnings for Motorola were down 45%, to 39 cents a share, although you could barely tell from the rosy picture painted by the earnings release; full of optimism about sales at $10.7 billion, up 17% from Q3 2005. We're waiting to see how investors react.

Update: investors were thrilled with IBM and sent stock up after hours to $91.32 from a close of $86.95. Motorola was terrible news and investors sent the stock tumbling to $22.90 from its already-lower close of $24.85.

5:27 p.m. While I'm waiting on hold for the Microsoft earnings call to begin, I keep checking the stock price in after-hours tradiing. It's at $25.64 right now, down over 5% from the close and edging ever closer to a 52-week low. I'm just starting to review their third-quarter 10-Q and I'll include comments as I listen in.

5:32 p.m. We're still on hold (guess all the reporters didn't call in at least 10 minutes ahead of time, as requested) and I'm noticing that cost of sales was way up - 66% 49% higher - from 3rd quarter 2005 to 3rd quarter 2006. G&A is down about half this much. What happened with that $665 million?

5:35 p.m. After a very scripted introduction (sounded like it was recorded by a computer and not a person), we hear that Microsoft "choose the right places to focus" with their SQL server sales, for instance, and is "ramping up the supply of Xbox 360 consoles."

5:38 p.m. Expect an increasing set of opportunities and challenges with regards to product launches like Xbox 360 consoles, and home entertainment sales are up 85%.

5:46 p.m. Continue to see a shift in "premium edition" OEM sales of MS software. They can't say enough about SQL servers. She puts extra emphasis on every adjective when she talks SQL.

5:47 p.m. Pleased with the great response that Office Live has received.

5:49 p.m. MSN revenue down - but advertising revenue up slightly, especially in instant messaging properties. "Made good progress" in transitioning search advertising from the Yahoo! platform to proprietary ad platform - and lower-than-expected performance from partner-driven ad search volume. Doesn't look like it's working as planned although they say that they're sure it was the right decision. Hmm.

Microsoft's third quarter earnings are out as of 10 minutes ago, and revenue is strong - up 13% to $10.9 billion. The big story is the big miss, however; the company earned only $0.32 a share, or $2.98 billion. That's a penny off analyst estimates of $0.33. Revenues were up, they say, thanks to business management and database software sales.

The big question on everyone's minds: what difference will a penny make? Not much, it seems, as MSFT is already up 18 cents in after-hours trading. Update: urggh. Investors not so happy anymore. The tide has reversed and now the stock is down $1.35 since market close to $25.75. More later...

[Photo Ron Wurzer/Getty Images]