Oracle's Stretch for Stability

Oracle's(ORCL - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) third-quarter earnings, due after Tuesday's closing bell, will be watched closely for indications that tech spending is holding firm.

The last earnings season served up unsettling news in that regard, particularly from Oracle and SAP(SAP - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr), "and investors want assurance that growth in spending will at least remain stable," says Standard & Poor's analyst Zaineb Bokhari.

In calmer times, a couple of weak quarters -- even from important companies -- wouldn't be a major problem. But the wild gyrations of the market in the last few weeks and the bearish sentiment surrounding the tech sector make a decent quarter by Oracle -- and bullish commentary from executives on the conference call -- all the more important.

Shares of Oracle appreciated strongly through most of last year. But the stock is off 12% since late November, closing Monday at $17.18, well below the 52-week high of $19.75.

The database giant is hardly alone, however. Big-cap software stocks are hurting, including Microsoft(MSFT - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr), down 7% in the same time frame; SAP, off 12%; and Symantec(SYMC - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr), down 21%.

Those heavyweight stocks are performing significantly worse than the tech universe in general, which is off just 1% in the same time period as measured by the Nasdaq, while the Goldman Sachs Software Index is off 2%.