The bulls found a home in Google on Friday. The stock price rose nearly $90 a share, on reports of 42% revenue growth in the first-quarter, bringing $28 billion in share-holder wealth to Wall Street. No doubt this Google news was welcomed in the face of staggering losses in the financial industry.

And Rick Pendergraft sees Google continuing it’s search and advertising dominance online even against the possible combination of Yahoo and Microsoft.

Monetary policy “walking a tightrope”…1,300 jobs go in the Square Mile… Britain’s second largest bank to go cap in hand to shareholders for a large dollop of cash..? Rice hits a record $1,000 a tonne…and one in ten face that old wealth destroyer from the early ‘90s: negative equity. So where to start..?

Nokia Shares Plummet on Missed Earnings; “The World” Developer Posts Quadrupled Annual Profits; Google Beats Estimates; Capital One Profit Drops 19%; TD Ameritrade Gets a Boost; Societe General Chief Steps Down; Avant Soars on Pfizer Deal; Southwest Ekes Out Profit.

This from MarketWatch:

Concerns about the impact of the credit crisis and the weak economy will come into sharp focus next week, with investors set for a flood of earnings from ailing financials as well as the technology sector.

Earnings results in focus include financials Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Washington Mutual and tech bellwethers Intel and Google.

Negotiations continue between Microsoft and Yahoo! about a possible merger between the software behemoth and the Internet giant.  Which of the names above do you like the best?