Week ahead: CSCO, AMAT, DELL earnings due

Several key tech firms are scheduled to report quarterly earnings in the coming week. Applied Materials Inc. (amat) will check in with its third-quarter earnings. First Call Corp. consensus expects the world's largest semiconductor-equipment maker to earn 68 cents a share in the quarter. The chip maker was on target last quarter, with profits of $454 milllion, or 55 cents per share, on sales of $2.19 billion. Dell Computer Corp. (dell) will be especially interesting to watch in the wake of this week's downgrade from USB Piper Jaffray. Dell is expected to earn 21 cents a share in its second quarter, up from the $525 million, or 19 cents a share, last quarter. Cisco Systems Inc. (csco) will report its fourth-quarter results next week with analysts predicting a profit of 15 cents a share. In the third quarter, Cisco earned $1.03 billion, or 14 cents a share, on sales of $4.92 billion. Full story. -- Larry Barrett, ZDNet Inter@ctive Investor