For whatever this is worth, we have considered that Nuance could ultimately be acquired.  The problem in thinking that Apple would acquire is that this Dragon NaturallySpeaking software is used on so many Windows machines. 

Speech-to-text and text-to-speech are likely to only grow.  Our take is that ultimately Nuance will be acquired.  The three acquirers we had considered as possible acquirers came to a tie between Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) followed in a distant third place by Adobe Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: ADBE).  The problem is that Nuance is getting pricey on a nominal dollar basis.

After a 10% pop to $22.00 and with just over 4 million shares traded already this morning, the market cap is now $6.6 billion.  The new 52-week range just went higher today and that is $14.45 to $22.93.  The average daily volume is about 2.35 million shares per day.

JON C. OGG

(10:17 AM EST)

AP Pharma Inc. (NASDAQ: APPA) is getting crushed after the FDA complete response letters has denied approval of the AP Pharma prevention of both acute and delayed onset chemotherapy-induced nausea drug. At 8:45 AM EST we have shares down 55% at $0.92 on 1.1+ million shares.  Average volume is only about 569,000 shares and the 52-week range is $0.38 to $2.16.  Yesterday’s market cap was $81 million, so we are just under $40 million now.

Palm Inc. (NASDAQ: PALM) is looking uglier than a hat full of fingers.  The earnings miss was not helped at all by a revenue beat.  Shipments were up but sell-throughs are soft and the company is going to be short of estimates again.  At 8:45 AM EST we have shares down 18% at $4.62 and the pre-market volume is 4.3 million shares.  Call this one a 52-week low.

Baidu, Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU) is up again ahead of what is expected to be a Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG)  announcement Monday about the search engine’s plans for China.  Fox reported that this annnouncement will be an exit. The verdict is in… either way, Google has a severely damaged brand in China that will only lead to more business for Baidu.  Baidu is up 2.3% at $577.88 on just over 50,000 shares and Google is down 0.9% at $561.30 on about 35,000 shares (8:45 AM EST).

Netlist Inc. (NASDAQ: NLST) is lower this morning on a capital raise.  The company is up exponentially from lows and announced the pricing of an underwritten public secondary offering of 3,995,000 shares at $3.85 per share for gross proceeds of approximately $15.38 million.  This is a higher share count than originally noted.  Shares closed at $4.23 Thursday and the stock is down almost 8% at $3.90 this morning at 8:45 but the volume is rather thin for the move and considering the cult stock status..

SunPower Corporation (NASDAQ: SPWRA) finally reported earnings.  The company’s profits fell and fell short of estimates and it restated previous earnings.  At 8:45 AM EST we have shares down 9.8% at $19.88 on 27,000 shares.

Addus HomeCare Corporation (NASDAQ: ADUS) posted lower-than-expected Q4 profits, and it was actually a loss due to the costs of the initial public offering.  This is still a thin volume stock of a company which provides a range of social and medical services to individuals in the home. At 8:46 AM EST shares are down almost 16% at $7.49 but only on about 3,200 shares versus a 32,000 share average per day.  The post-IPO range has been $7.52 to $9.72.

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JON C. OGG

At 15:28:02 today there was a trade of 750,000 shares of GOOG at $545.15 on the CSE rather than on NASDAQ.  The bid/ask at the time was approximately $545.20 / $545.53.  As with all actual trades, the actual trade time can differ from the reported trade time.  Many after-hours trades or pre-market trades are the evidence of that.  This one was close enough to the bid/ask spread that it was likely not too far off on the time.

But here is the issue.  Almost all trades listed on NASDAQ under GOOG are in 100 share lots to 500 share lots.  After all, 100 shares is $54,500 or so at that price.  The 750,000 share block was $408,862,500.00…..

Generally when you see trades this size, it is because someone wants to advertise their trade.  A big trade indeed.

JON C. OGG

JON C. OGG

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) up 0.15% at $597.51 on 965,000 shares.
CALL$    Volume    OpInt.
590.00    822    4,137
600.00    1,768    9,757
610.00    1,007    3,390
620.00    595    3,681
630.00    1,154    2,818
640.00    632    3,639
650.00    1,174    4,921

Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) up 3% at $132.33 on over 5.1 million shares.
CALL$    Volume    OpInt.
125.00    1,950    8,478
130.00    5,396    11,755
135.00    5,685    12,390
140.00    3,710    8,751
145.00    4,961    8,851
150.00    1,504    7,958

Research-in-Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) up 0.4% at $70.29 on about 10.7 million shares.
70.00    13,681    54,332
73.38    3,971    10,631
75.00    7,027    38,981
76.63    1,626    7,313
80.00    2,417    103,417
83.38    259    3,890
85.00    1,218    13,788

As a reminder, each 10,000 option contracts is the equivalent of 1 million shares of common stock on a fully leveraged basis.  With that in mind, the actual bets being made are much larger than the raw shares traded mid-day may indicate.

JON C. OGG
DECEMBER 21, 2009

Google is at $570.30 as of 2:15 PM EST, yet we are not seeing any significant roll-outs into December-2009 or even Jan-2010 options

NOVEMBER 2009 CALLS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
560.00    1,179    3,921
570.00    9,110    5,298
580.00    3,011    6,295

NOVEMBER 2009 PUTS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
560.00    2,392    4,190
570.00    13,885    5,374
580.00    854    1,153

Apple is at $200.15 as of 2:15 PM EST… But unlike Google, there is a significant roll-out taking place into many of the same or out of the money strikes into December….

NOVEMBER 2009 CALLS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
190.00    2,413    13,128
195.00    4,920    21,074
200.00    36,083    32,022
210.00    5,081    48,971

NOVEMBER 2009 PUTS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
195.00    3,681    21,961
200.00    24,337    23,592
210.00    1,425    8,931

DECEMBER 2009 CALLS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
190.00    1,403    5,502
195.00    2,758    9,172
200.00    9,101    25,129
210.00    8,367    35,741
220.00    5,411    21,227
230.00    1,030    28,445

DECEMBER 2009 PUTS
$TRIKE    Volume    Op.Int.
175.00    1,241    20,578
180.00    2,748    37,580
185.00    2,703    36,755
190.00    2,384    14,033
195.00    4,279    8,952
200.00    3,893    12,631
210.00    1,117    7,172

As a reminder, 10,000 contracts equals 1 million shares on a fully leveraged basis.   In Apple that is over 47,000 contracts in the NOV-2009 Calls and over 29,000 NOV-2009 Puts, which is 16,000 Calls or 1.6 million shares equivalent on a fully leveraged basis if you deduct the puts from the calls; AND that is over 27,000 contracts in the close Calls and 18,000 in the close Puts.  If these just acted to cancel each other out, then that would leave an extra 9,000 Call contracts or 900,000 shares on a fully leveraged basis.  With just over 10 million shares traded so far, that is fairly significant considering there is under two hours to the close.

JON C. OGG

Google closed at $529.91 and shares are up almost 3% at $545.77, but only on about 25,619 as of 8:17 AM EST.  Be advised that in the after-hours session last night Google traded at $547.00, up by 3.23% on about 1.86 million shares, so this trading volume is rather light considering the trading yesterday.  These prices will be new 52-week highs if the price gains hold up.

JON C. OGG
OCTOBER 16, 2009

CALL$    Volume    OpInt.
500.00    1,417    5,824
510.00    745    5,270
520.00    1,654    4,085
530.00    3,240    6,962
540.00    4,572    13,439
550.00    7,702    12,798
560.00    4,756    7,865
570.00    4,374    7,157
580.00    2,965    5,162
590.00    2,651    2,937

PUT$     Volume  OpInt
450.00    467    5,736
460.00    476    9,682
470.00    1,429    8,304
480.00    2,279    7,516
490.00    2,864    6,987
500.00    4,328    10,729
510.00    2,346    3,464
520.00    2,497    6,026
530.00    2,879    2,476
540.00    984    535
550.00    207    417
600.00    1,150    2,357

We have just now crossed the 2 million share mark and this stock is down 0.9% right at the $530.00 mark after hitting a 52-week high of $536.90 late this morning.  Average volume is 2.7 million shares.  The call option activity of almost 30,000 contracts represents 3 million shares on a fully leveraged basis.

TIME STAMP 1:49 PM EST

JON C. OGG
OCTOBER 15, 2009