Quote of the day

Steve Jobs, “Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”  (Stanford)

Chart of the day

A sign of hope for the US banks?  (Phil Pearlman)

Markets

The S&P 500 is rapidly approaching resistance.  (Bespoke)

What if this is simply another countertrend move?  (Investing With Options)

There is a kink in the $VIX futures curve.  (SurlyTrader)

Looking ahead to the non-farm payroll release.  (Dynamic Hedge)

Commodities

What commodities are more at-risk in a global recession.  (FT Alphaville)

Gold and silver are coming to a head.  (chessNwine)

What is going on with lumber?  (StockCharts Blog)

Strategy

Don’t fall prey to claims built on data mining.  (Above the Market)

The game may be rigged, but can you afford not to play?  (Random Roger)

On the barriers to innovation in quantitative investing.  (CSS Analytics)

Adam Warner with insight into Trading Option Backspreads. (Amazon)*

An excerpt from Michael Martin’s The Inner Voice of Trading on “trading tuition.”  (SMB Training)*

Companies

Apps are the new songs.  (Asymco)

FedEx ($FDX) does not see a recession.  (Pragmatic Capitalism)

Finance

Details of the Volcker Rule.  (American Banker)

On the upshot of the BNY Mellon forex case. (Dealbreaker)

How Occupy Wall Street is just like Davos, kind, sorta.  (Daniel Gross)

Old middle aged guys rule.  Mid-life is prime time for finance.  (WSJ)

ETFs

Even total market ETFs can show performance differences.  (IndexUniverse)

The $VXX is doing what it is supposed to do.  (MarketSci Blog)

ETFs vs. ETNs:  Josh makes the call.  (The Reformed Broker)

Global

The Bank of England rejoins the QE fray.  (Gavyn Davies, Free exchange)

China has an investment conundrum.  (EconomPic Data)

Economy

Weekly initial unemployment claims continue to hug 400,000.  (Calculated Risk, Money Game, CBP)

Slow economic growth continues.  (Econbrowser)

Rail traffic is surging.  (ValuePlays)

What retail sales say about the economy.  (Crackerjack Finance)

The growing spread of Washington-based benefits.  (Real Time Economics)

30-year mortgage rates are below 4.00%.  (Marketwatch)

Earlier on Abnormal Returns

What NeXT for Apple?  (Abnormal Returns)

What you missed in our Thursday morning linkfest.  (Abnormal Returns)

Mixed media

How to fix investment contests.  (Aleph Blog)

You think your boss is bad!  (Altucher Confidential)

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*Amazon affiliate.  You know the drill.