Fun, funds, and failure will color in the week that lies ahead.
Monday
Are we having FUN yet? If you're a fan of ticker symbols, that's what Cedar Fair (NYSE:FUN) will bring to the party come Monday afternoon. The regional amusement park operator may not be able to shed a whole lot of light onto its recently acquired Paramount Parks chain, but it should have a good read as to how the telltale summer season is going. The June quarter isn't as potent as the current September chunk, but analysts do expect earnings per unit to climb from $0.22 last year to $0.30 this time around. The company's consistent growth and a beefy 7.5% yield helped make this a recommendation for Motley Fool Income Investor newsletter subscribers.
Tuesday
Video game giant Motley Fool Stock Advisor recommendation Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:ERTS) gets into the game on Tuesday with its fiscal first-quarter report. The industry is in a holding pattern right now. Until the new PS3 and Wii platforms hit the market later this year, sales are likely to be light, and investors at this point are simply holding on for what lies at the other end of this year's holiday shopping season.
Wednesday
The middle of the week will be about time, at least about Time Warner (NYSE:TWX). The now widely panned merger between America Online and Time Warner took place several years ago, but the company has yet to get back on track, even now that the media conglomerate's market cap is less than that of Time Warner or AOL as stand-alone companies before they tied the knot.
The challenges are real. AOL is losing subscribers. Time Warner's media properties are facing lackluster ad growth. Time Warner is another Stock Advisor pick, but its hurdles are much higher than just waiting for a new next generation gaming systems to take off.
Thursday
How bright does the Morningstar (NASDAQ:MORN) star shine? We'll let Thursday be the judge of that. The financial services researcher is a bit of a kindred spirit around Fooldom. The company was demystifying mutual funds in the 1990s and empowering individual investors the way we were in the stock world. Shannon Zimmerman cut his teeth there as a lead analyst before returning to Fool.com to launch Motley Fool Champion Funds.
Analysts expect the company's Thursday morning report to be a good one, with earnings clocking in at $0.28 a share -- 27% higher than last year's profitability. There is irony here if you're willing to taste it. You can use the same five-star rating system that the company uses on mutual funds -- and now stocks -- on the company itself, depending on where it lands relative to the $0.28 mark.
Friday
The next time you find yourself having a contest with friends to see who can come up with the coolest name for a company, arm yourself with WebSideStory (NASDAQ:WSSI). Thankfully, there's more to the company than a cool moniker. The provider of website tracking services is also consistently profitable and has managed to eke out better-than-expected results in each of the past three quarters. Oh, when you're a Jet. Friday it goes for four.
Until next week, I remain,
Rick Munarriz
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Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz recommends windshield wiper fluid when trying to look forward. He owns shares in Cedar Fair. The Fool has a disclosure policy. Rick is also part of the
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