- A total of 130 companies in S&P 500, or 26% of the index, hit 52-week highs yesterday, while no companies hit fresh lows, Bespoke says. “While net new highs had been struggling to expand in recent months, today’s reading marks a new bull market high.”
- Sirius XM (SIRI) gets a delisting notice from Nasdaq. “An ominous threat, but one not likely to be carried out,” Digital Daily blogger John Paczkowski says, noting Sirius is appealing the notice and seeking an extension from Nasdaq. “Frankly, with over 3.7 billion shares outstanding, there’s little reason to fear Sirius will be booted from Nasdaq.”
- Can’t sugarcoat it: The aughts were awful. Atlanta Fed’s macroblog looks at trough-to-trough periods based on real GDP growth, and determines 2002-09 period was one of the worst since 1930s. “No other previous period comes close.”
- What exactly does the VIX tell us? FT Alphaville weighs in on the debate.
- Weekly jobless claims and consumer prices data suggest “the heavy lifting of rebuilding the economy is upon us,” James Picerno says.
- “Congress did not need to deregulate Wall Street – they only had to defund the SEC – which is what effectively happened,” Barry Ritholtz writes. “Hence, the chief cop on the Wall Street beat was outgunned, overmatched, undermanned and out-lawyered by the industry they were supposed to be regulating. How can that possibly have been any good for investors?”
- HTC has flimsy defense against Apple, John Paczkowski says. Its main argument: it’s been making smartphones longer than Apple. “While it’s certainly possible that might be the case, it’s hard to accept that argument without a list of patents to back it up. Harder still, when HTC says nothing about its legal strategy for dealing with Apple’s assault.”
- More bailed out banks failed to pay a quarterly dividend to the government in February. The number hit 82 last month, up from 55 in November 2009.
- Apple’s (AAPL) already pre-sold hundreds of thousands of iPads in anticipation of April’s official release, WSJ reports.
- First upset of the NCAA Tournament’s already in. No. 11 Old Dominion defeats No. 6 Notre Dame in the opening round.
