CHICAGO, Jan. 22, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include the IBM Corp. (NYSE:IBM-Free Report), Intel (Nasdaq:INTC-Free Report), Google (Nasdaq:GOOG-Free Report), Apple (Nasdaq:AAPL-Free Report) and Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT-Free Report).

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20101027/ZIRLOGO)

Today, Zacks is promoting its ''Buy'' stock recommendations. Get #1Stock of the Day pick for free.

Here are highlights from Tuesday's Analyst Blog:

IBM Beats Earnings, Misses Revs

IBM Corp. (NYSE:IBM-Free Report) continued informing the tech industry's Q4 earnings after the bell Tuesday with a mixed report: the world's largest tech services company reported $6.13 per share, beating the expected $6.01 per share, but reported $27.7 billion, which missed the $28.5 billion expected by the Zacks Consensus Estimate.

Sales are down 5.5% year over year, which adds to the the overall Big Tech scenario that enterprises have yet to make big investments back into technology. We saw with Intel (Nasdaq:INTC-Free Report) last week that this cyclical revenue growth trend looks to be pushed out at least another quarter or two. So it seems to be with IBM, as well.

Guidance also looks flat-to-down for fiscal 2014: the company expects to make "at least" $17 per share for the year, where analysts had been expecting at least $18 per share.

IBM shares are down 2+% in the after-market after initially ticking upward. This followed a 0.87% drop in regular-day trading Tuesday in anticipation of the Q4 earnings report. Again, this follows the narrative that the tech industry is going to have to wait a little while longer (at least) to find a little traction.

Because Tech and Finance make up such a substantial part of the U.S. economy and both report in the earlier stages of earnings season, we tend to bend a bit toward the results in these industries early on. And while the overall economy is expected to pick up meaningfully in 2014, either we will see marked improvement elsewhere as earnings season moves along -- including Big Tech companies yet to report, like Google (Nasdaq:GOOG-Free Report), Apple (Nasdaq:AAPL-Free Report), Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT-Free Report), and many others -- or we will need to push out our growth expectations to the next three months and possibly beyond.

Near-term, IBM is trading down, and Tech is following Finance with a mildly disappointing Q4 overall. Let's see if there may be some diamonds in the rough in other reports this week.

Today, Zacks is promoting its ''Buy'' stock recommendations. Get #1Stock of the Day pick for free.

About Zacks Equity Research

Zacks Equity Research provides the best of quantitative and qualitative analysis to help investors know what stocks to buy and which to sell for the long-term.

Continuous coverage is provided for a universe of 1,150 publicly traded stocks. Our analysts are organized by industry which gives them keen insights to developments that affect company profits and stock performance. Recommendations and target prices are six-month time horizons.

Zacks "Profit from the Pros" e-mail newsletter provides highlights of the latest analysis from Zacks Equity Research. Subscribe to this free newsletter today.

About Zacks

Zacks.com is a property of Zacks Investment Research, Inc., which was formed in 1978. The later formation of the Zacks Rank, a proprietary stock picking system; continues to outperform the market by nearly a 3 to 1 margin. The best way to unlock the profitable stock recommendations and market insights of Zacks Investment Research is through our free daily email newsletter; Profit from the Pros. In short, it's your steady flow of Profitable ideas GUARANTEED to be worth your time! Register for your free subscription to Profit from the Pros.

Get the full Report on IBM - FREE

Get the full Report on INTC - FREE

Get the full Report on GOOG - FREE

Get the full Report on AAPL - FREE

Get the full Report on MSFT - FREE

Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/zacksresearch

Join us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Zacks-Investment-Research/57553657748?ref=ts

Zacks Investment Research is under common control with affiliated entities (including a broker-dealer and an investment adviser), which may engage in transactions involving the foregoing securities for the clients of such affiliates.

Media Contact
Zacks Investment Research
800-767-3771 ext. 9339
support@zacks.com
http://www.zacks.com

Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit http://www.zacks.com/performance for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.

SOURCE Zacks Investment Research, Inc.