Defensive sectors have underperformed during the most recent rally.  (Bespoke)

A summary of where we stand from a technical standpoint.  (The Pragmatic Capitalist)

Why the 200 day moving average matters.  (Trader’s Narrative)

Hedge funds down in January but best major asset classes.  (DealBook)

Paolo Pelligrini is short America and long commodities.  (market folly)

Do you want to get a piece of John Paulson’s hedge fund?  (Clusterstock)

Individual investors are warming to ETFs and the brokers have noticed.  (WSJ)

Novel ETF structures generate new tax issues.  (Morningstar)

To short or not to short?  Two different views.  (Finance Trends Matter)

Ten things I learned from trader Brian Shannon.  (SMB Training)

Can you improve on good old fashioned price momentum in a sector rotation strategy?  (CXO Advisory Group)

What is the “affect hypothesis” and how does it mislead investors in glamour companies?  (SSRN)

An extended piece on the risk and rewards of high-frequency trading.  (FT also Zero Hedge)

Social networks that used to inform individual financial behavior have broken down.  (The Psy-Fi Blog)

How greater use of exchange-traded “vanilla options” could transform the derivatives business.  (Rortybomb)

David Rosenberg is looking for a better entry point for commodities. (Fortune)

Is the big for General Growth Properties a sign that retail has bottomed?  (Economist)

Matt Taibbi, “The bottom line is that banks like Goldman have learned absolutely nothing from the global economic meltdown.” (Rolling Stone also Big Picture, Crossing Wall Street)

“Intentional or not, however, Goldman’s current PR strategy is truly dangerous. It does not take into account that Goldman is simply too big, too interconnected, and, yes, too successful to behave like an arrogant Big Swinging Dick toward everybody.”  (Epicurean Dealmaker)

Wasn’t AIG supposed to be broken up and sold off to help repay the Feds?  (naked capitalism)

Remove the Fed from bank supervision at your own risk.  (Dealbreaker)

Stunning graph of the ratio of cash assets to business loans at US commercial banks.  (Free exchange)

Mike Konczal, “..the fact that [the GSEs] it might have been ready to go as a garbage bag for the private sector’s bad bets, a bag taxpayers have to eat out of, has been the most surprising, and terrible, thing about it in this crisis.”  (Rortybomb)

Apparently everyone in Euroland is cheating on their debt levels.  (The Money Game)

The collective inability of governments to manage their budgets or reform their financial systems is predictable (and depressing).  (DJ Market Talk)

Did the stimulus help?  (Baseline Scenario, Slate, Econbrowser)

A Pew Study fails eight states on their underfunding of retiree benefits.  (Pew, NYTimes, Mish)

More cities are weighing bankruptcy protection.  (WSJ)

Nathan Myhrvold, “I believe that invention is set to become the next software: a high-value asset that will serve as the foundation for new business models, liquid markets, and investment strategies.”  (HBR, NYTimes)

A new modular technology allows for the wider use of nuclear power.  (WSJ)

Does the extraction of oil actually change the spinning of the planet itself? (Infectious Greed)

StockTwits is all new.  What should you do on your first visit?  (StockTwits Blog, Howard Lindzon)

Do you want to feel happier?  Schedule a vacation.  (Science Blog)

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