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Not as if the earnings weeks can get any bigger, right? Today, Yahoo! (YHOO) reports, tomorrow Amazon (AMZN), Wednesday Facebook (FB) and Qualcomm (QCOM), as far as all of the big tech names go anyway. If that's not enough, Exxon (XOM), Time Warner (TWX), Boeing (BA) and Ford (F) all report to round out an even better look at where this economy is headed this year.

This morning, Caterpillar (CAT) provided the Street with a look at their fourth quarter, which was important because CAT has become somewhat of a bellwether for global growth and demand. The world's largest heavy equipment maker, projected 2013 per-share earnings of $7 to $9 on revenue of $60 billion to $68 billion. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters recently expected $8.54 and $65.12 billion, respectively.

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The markets are moving around like a yo-yo intraday, as the bulls and bears battle it out for control of the markets going into another big earnings week next week. Who will win the battle is anyone's guess, but the strength of the markets for the rest of January hinges primarily on the numbers coming from behemoth stocks like Amazon (AMZN), Facebook (FB), Caterpillar (CAT), Qualcomm (QCOM) and Yahoo! (YHOO) all set to report. Will they provide the necessary numbers to propel the markets to new multi-year highs?

The benchmark S&P 500 index is up 5.2 percent so far in January. The equity market's strong start this year has been attributed to solid corporate results, an agreement in Washington to extend the government's borrowing power, encouraging signs from the global economy and seasonal inflows into stocks. Those factors helped the S&P 500 rally for a seventh day on Thursday to reach a five-year peak. But the index has struggled to convincingly climb above 1,500, a level it surpassed briefly on Thursday for the first time since December 2007.

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The markets have gone absolutely crazy over Google's (GOOG) and IBM's (IBM) numbers yesterday with both stocks up sharply on the afternoon. The DOW leads the charge with the NASDAQ following suit and the S&P giving some of the sunshine back to its counterparts today. After being the leader all year long so far, it's probably a pretty welcomed event for investors who tend to put more of an emphasis on tech even with the rest of the markets' hottest sectors outperforming in recent weeks. Just last week, it was Conglomerates, Services, Basic Materials, Consumer Goods and Financials leading the way, but with EBay, Google and IBM now all posting strong numbers, tech is back in focus.

Although tech traders and investors are having an excellent day, Conglomerates are still the best performers for the year up 5.6% year-to-date with Financials a close 2nd at 4.7% on the year.

In this morning's SmallCap Network Elite Opportunity (SCN EO) Member Newsletter, Senior Analyst John Monroe, provided commentary regarding the tech space and the importance of Apple's numbers after the close today. He mentions, "From a technical and fundamental perspective, tech needs to continue to perform if the markets are going to continue to grind higher. With Apple (AAPL) reporting after the close today, that's one huge pocket for the general space that could likely put the nail in the coffin for the bulls. If Apple beats, which remains to be seen, tech could very well explode to the upside in runaway fashion. If Apple misses, we're likely in for a short-term pullback, but that won't necessarily suggest the bulls' run for the mid-term is over."

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We received a significant amount of feedback regarding last week's op-ed on the whole fiscal cliff debt ceiling debate. Since we have so many readers, as well as folks here at SCN with opposing opinions, we'll include a piece of feedback forwarded to me from another reader over the weekend. This just goes to show how opposite the belief system surrounding our fiscal policies are these days, and how polarizing the strength of opinions are. One reader, who we'll keep their name anonymous, wrote...

"Thank you for sending this; this is a curious interpretation of the data. I note that the writer cites no sources or facts as such, he/she simply makes claims.

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I was just forwarded an interesting email from one of our SCN EO Team Members regarding the whole debt ceiling debate that we thought we'd share with you. The email originated from one of you out there, and we appreciate any and all comments since the SmallCap Network is of the community nature. It's not the first time we've gotten some intelligent opinions from readers, and likely not the last.

Since it's been such a hot topic of late, he provided some insight many of you might find interesting and useful when trying to decipher just what these markets plan to do in 2013, as it relates to all of the media's obsession with our current deficit issue. We're keeping the reader's name anonymous for obvious reasons. Here's the bullet points from his email, and whoever you are, thanks for sending it in.