In particular, notice how much the daily range has narrowed over the last six months. This, my friends, is the big story. Investors have chilled out in a major way.

Oracle is using acquisitions to build its cloud business as part of efforts to help blunt the impact of a possible slowdown in software sales growth. Cloud services are meant to appeal to customers seeking to save money by letting them access computing power over the Web. Taleo is another fit-in with that strategy, following the $1.5 billion purchase of RightNow Technologies Inc. (RNOW) last year, said Mark Moerdler, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. in New York.

“Taleo is the next-largest player in the talent-management space,” said Moerdler, who rates Oracle “market perform.”

Credit Suisse Internet analyst Heath Terry this morning raised his price target for Google (GOOG) to $900, from $800, in what he describes as an “attempt to better account for long-term opportunities in areas like display, local and mobile.”

Terry contends that “as all advertising goes digital, including television, radio and outdoor, and Google becomes the de facto operating system for advertisers, providing them with the dashboard to monitor and optimize their advertising, tremendous value will be created for Google shareholders.”

He sees the advertising opportunity driving top line growth of 35% or more, and profit growth of at least 30%, over the next five years.

Terry upped his 2008 EPS estimate to $18.93 from $18.75.

He also says that the company eventually will get “effectively” 100% of the Internet search market. He expects ongoing share gains to provide 38% growth in its search business over the next five years.

Google today is up $25.60, or 4%, to $651.45.

This is one of the those stocks that you watch go up and up, and beat yourself up for not getting in earlier. The stock is up again today on strong results:

Visa Inc. (V) posted a 16.4% increase in fiscal first-quarter profit as the credit-card processor continued to benefit from consumers’ increased use of plastic while grappling with new federal rules that affect debit-card purchases.

The San Francisco-based company said Wednesday cardholders ratcheted up their use of Visa’s credit and debit cards, driving up the volume of transactions it processed 8% to 13.6 billion.

“Consumers’ desire to use our products is evident in the strong growth we see outside the U.S. and the resiliency we are seeing in the U.S. in the wake of debit regulation,” Joe Saunders, chairman and chief executive of Visa, said in a statement.

Visa posted net income of $1.03 billion, or $1.49 per share, up from $884 million, or $1.23 per share, a year ago. Revenue rose 13.8% to $2.55 billion.

Visa’s results beat the estimates of analysts, who were expecting the company to earn $1.45 per share on revenue of $2.43 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.

The company said its board of directors authorized a new $500 million repurchase program for Class A shares.

The stock is currently at $112. Wall Street expects them to earn $5.87 per share for this fiscal year (ending in September) and $6.80 for next year. Unfortunately, it’s starting to look pricey now.

If anyone needs me, I’ll be beating myself up some more.

Today, two key members of the company’s management team announced their retirements. The CFO, Lewis Booth, and global product chief, Derrick M. Kuzak, will leave their positions on April 1. The best news for investors is that Alan Mulally said he has no plans to leave anytime soon. Mulally has been critical to Ford’s turnaround.

Last month, Ford had a fairly mediocre earnings report. I expect that the next earnings report in late April will be much better. Ford’s stock is currently up 18% on the year for us.

The important thing here is the trend. While the jobs market remains weak, we now have evidence that things are getting better. The problem, of course, is that things are getting better at a very slow pace.

Combined with last week’s jobs report which showed that the unemployment rate dropped to 8.3%, we can see that the economy is improving.

China Inflation Spike Pricks Policy Easing Expectations

Chinese Policy Banks Looking to Make Yuan Loans in Latin America

Holiday Hits China Auto Sales in January

Indonesia Unexpectedly Cuts Interest Rate to Support Growth

Obama Advisers Offer Rosier Jobs Outlook

Fed Delays Vote on Capital One Deal for ING Direct

States Negotiate $26 Billion Deal for Homeowners

Goldman Wins New York Fed Auction for A.I.G. Assets

Groupon Posts Loss of $9.8 Million

Credit Suisse Posts First Loss in Three Years

Daimler Profit Rises on Record Mercedes Demand

Caesars Surges 71% in Debut After Slashing IPO From 2010 Try

ING Feels Impact of Euro Crisis

Alibaba Seeks to Buy Back Yahoo Stake

Joshua Brown: The Economy’s Improving, Have a Cupcake

Jeff Miller: Navigating Silly Season: An Investor Guide to the Political Landscape

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Here’s a look at how the different S&P sectors performed last year and this year so far. Notice how (except for telecom which probably shouldn’t be its own sector) the rank ordering is almost completely inverted from 2011 to 2012.

This morning, I pointed out what I thought were good earnings from Wright Express ($WXS). Yet the shares dropped 5% early today. Wright then rallied to a 5% gain. That’s a 10% turnaround in 90 minutes.

Why?

Honestly, I have no idea, and you can’t say why traders act they way they do. Wright held their earnings call at 10 am, but there was nothing there that should have altered anyone’s perception of the stock. This is another reason why I avoid trading and focus on the fundamentals. A stock can fool the market for a while, but eventually, the true value will shine through.

Apple’s report “obfuscates the fact that the underlying earnings trend is really weak,” Golub said. “It’s a terrific company, but it’s also important you get a sense of how the average stock, the average company is doing. You want to make sure you don’t distort that view.”

Analysts project income for S&P 500 companies climbed 4.9 percent in the fourth quarter, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Out of 280 companies that have reported since Jan. 9, 68 percent have exceeded analysts’ estimates by an average 2.9 percent, while profit has gained 3.5 percent.