Before the open this morning, Aetna (AET: sentiment, chart, options) affirmed its 2008 earnings forecast of $3.90 - $3.95 per share. Aetna added that it will update its 2009 forecast currently expected at 12% to 14% growth in operating earnings per share, excluding rising pension costs. Including the projected year-over-year increase in pension expense of 54 cents per share, Aetna projects full-year 2009 operating earnings per share to be slightly lower than 2008.

Options players are currently optimistic about the stock's prospects. The Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio (SOIR) for AET stands at 0.55, as call open interest nearly doubles puts open interest among near-term options. This reading is lower than 82% of all those taken during the past 52 weeks, indicating that short-term options speculators have been more optimistically aligned just 18% of the time during the past year.

Wall Street is also smitten with the shares, as 10 of the 13 analysts following AET rate it a "buy" or better, leaving the security vulnerable to downgrades.

From a technical perspective, the stock is battling staunch resistance at the 30 level -- a round-number region that has capped the stock during the past 2 weeks. A rejection here could cause some of the bullish sentiment to unwind toward the shares.