April is always full of action, and that's before we delve deep into your tax filings.

Eye the calendar and you will find some meaty corporate events that may very well shape the market. Here are a few of the days that I plan to approach with eyes wide open.

April 15
Is Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) still whimpering over the Fed's decision to keep the banking giant from hiking its dividend later this year? Most of its "too big to fail" buddies were given the green light to initiate payout hikes, but Bank of America's financial fortitude didn't pass the regulatory sniff test. It's the equivalent of having to write lines on the chalkboard while your schoolmates are frolicking on the playground monkey bars.

We'll get a closer look under Bank of America's dissed hood when the banker posts its quarterly results in two weeks.

Analysts expect Bank of America to come through with its fifth consecutive profitable quarter since the government bailout.

April 19
If I had a quarter for every tablet that was hyped up as an iPad killer I'd be pulling an all-nighter at the pinball machine. Folks don't want a tablet. They want an iPad.

The last real threat for the iPad comes on April 19, when Research In Motion (Nasdaq: RIMM) introduces the PlayBook tablet. RIM has a clean shot at being a legitimate contender. PlayBook's playbook is to win over its tens of millions of BlackBerry users, particularly those in the enterprise space that see the iPad as a consumer novelty.

It won't be easy, but RIM needs this to work. The stock was crushed last week after the BlackBerry maker followed up a solid quarter with uninspiring near-term guidance. 

April 20
There's a lot on AT&T's (NYSE: T) plate these days.

Between the pending T-Mobile acquisition, losing iPhone exclusivity, and its plans to eliminate unlimited data for broadband the way it did last summer for wireless, there's a lot of juggling going on at Ma Bell.

The telco behemoth's April 20 quarterly conference call should shed some light on AT&T's many developments. Shareholders may want to sit at a safe distance since corporate juggling of sharp objects can be painful if they slip.

April 26
AutoNation (NYSE: AN) pulls into its quarterly showroom during the final week of the month.

As the country's largest automotive retailer through its 243 showrooms, AutoNation is a great proxy for the state of consumer appetite for big-ticket drives. Are Japanese factory outages crimping supplies?

It's not just AutoNation investors that will likely be tuning in. Strong or weak sales may move shares of Sirius XM Radio (Nasdaq: SIRI), since the satellite radio giant relies on brisk auto sales to drum up new trial subscribers.

April 27
Akamai (Nasdaq: AKAM) -- the biggest name in Web-based content delivery -- reports on April 27.

It isn't always easy being a content-delivery network. Demand is high because most sites serving up chunky media files on quick-loading Web pages rely on server farms, but the cutthroat competition among suppliers is fierce.

There were some growth hiccups for Akamai during the darkest recessionary stretches, but analysts see the dot-com fave posting its fifth consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth.

April 28
There's never a dull quarter for Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT). Here are some questions to keep in mind heading into this month's fiscal third-quarter report.

  • Are Windows 7 and Office 2010 still selling well?
  • Is the Xbox 360 still the console to beat since the successful Kinect controller rollout?
  • When will Mr. Softy stop losing money in its online business?
  • Is it too late to matter in the realm of mobile operating systems?

We probably won't get all of the answers, but just enough to keep us going for another three months.

What are you looking forward to this month? Check in with your expectations in the comment box below.