Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of business software giant Oracle (Nasdaq: ORCL) could use some sage advice today after falling as much as 14.6% on downright epic trading volume.

So what: Last night's second-quarter report just didn't measure up to Wall Street expectations. Oracle reported $0.54 of non-GAAP earnings per share on $8.8 billion in sales, falling short of the $0.57 and $9.2 billion respective consensus targets.

Now what: At least three analysts downgraded Oracle shares or slashed price targets, noting that the company is "behind the curve" in cloud computing and waiting in vain for hardware orders to roll in. The market took this report as generally bad news for enterprise computing, giving IBM (NYSE: IBM) a 4.3% intraday haircut and TIBCO Software (Nasdaq: TIBX) a dramatic 14.9% drop.

TIBCO reports earnings tonight, and will give us more clues about the health of the software industry. Frankly, I expect TIBCO, Big Blue, and others to do well in spite of Oracle's weak mojo. The company made some questionable business decisions nearly three years ago that are coming back to haunt it today.

Interested in more info about Oracle? Click here to add it to My Watchlist.