“The stock market still has big hurdles to clear. You can have a jobless recovery, but you can’t have a profitless recovery.” (WSJ.com also Big Picture)

“Gold gurus, like most other gurus, are adept at extrapolating short-term trends into long-term and non-sustainable straight lines. This refers to downward trends as well as upward surges.” (Crossing Wall Street)

Ford’s (F) sale of equity makes sense, but why is Microsoft (MSFT) offerings bonds? (Felix Salmon, Breakingviews)

What are the early cycle stocks telling us? (greenfaucet.com)

Determining sentiment is tougher than it looks. (Sentiment’s Edge)

Was Meredith Whitney setting up shop a contrarian indicator? (Peridot Capitalist)

Using momentum signals on asset classes seems to make sense. (CXO Advisory Group)

Crude oil and stocks have been trading together to an unusual degree. (Bespoke)

Complaints about the influence of the United States Natural Gas Fund (UNG). (FT Alphaville)

Sun Microsystems (JAVA) is “worth watching as an arb opportunity.” (Research Reloaded)

Ackman’s “desperate fight” against Target (TGT) management. (DealBook also Felix Salmon, Clusterstock, Dealbreaker, market folly)

Talk of green shoots comes to the world of private equity. (peHUB.com, DealZone)

Could Merrill Lynch be publicly traded once again? (Dealscape also Clusterstock)

Does GMAC need to be saved? (WSJ.com)

Ugh. Fannie and Freddie have an insatiable appetite for taxpayer funds. (Clusterstock)

The bank stress tests were not all that stressful, redux. (Aleph Blog, Zero Hedge also The Stash)

“..when you go up against the government in a financial negotiation where it holds all the cards—including some of yours—you are going to get your head handed to you on a platter. Deal with it.” (Epicurean Dealmaker)

The Chrysler bankruptcy should be struck down. (Forbes.com)

“So why should we worry about the ability of the government to borrow?” (Atlantic Business)

“We won’t know the final outcome of this recession for a while, but I can safely say that the current situation is nowhere near as bad as the situation during the 1930’s.” (Freakonomics)

“The economy looks to be turning a corner relative to the downward cyclical force of last year. But this is only a partial victory…” (Economist’s View)

However, no recovery in these measures. (Pragmatic Capitalist, EconomPic Data)

Neuroeconomics is a “hoax.” (Marketwatch.com also Random Roger)

Chart.ly and StockTwits get hitched. (TechCrunch)

“What the world really needs is a product that will prevent people from using their own dumbass ideas to invest.” (Dilbert.com)

The (ridiculous) economics of the new Yankee Stadium. (kottke.org)

Make sure you don’t miss any Abnormal Returns posts. Feel free to add our fan-friendly feed to your favorite feed reader.