How churn in the job market changed during the Great Recession and what that change has meant for the broader economy. –Free Exchange

Earnings season is getting better – Bespoke

Jeremy Grantham hates bonds. He really, really hates bonds. – The Source

11 spectacularly unsuccessful CEOs — Financial Post

• Worst week (point and percent) since the week ended December 30, 2011.
• Today, it fell 89.23 points, or 0.69%.
• Biggest point and percent drop since this year, since December 28, 2011.
• Today’s top contributors to the Dow’s movement and their point contribution: HD (0.45), KO (-0.23), WMT (-0.45), KFT (-0.45), DIS (-0.61).
• Today’s laggards and their point contribution: XOM (-8.33), CVX (-8.25), CAT (-8.17), BA (-7.19), DD (-6.89).
• Year-to-date, it is up 4.78%.

Nasdaq Composite, down 1.78 points this week, or 0.06% to 2903.88.

• Today, it fell 23.35 points, or 0.80%.
• Biggest point and percent drop this year, since December 28, 2011.
• Year-to-date, it is up 11.47%.

S&P 500, fell 2.26 points this week, or 0.17% to 1342.64.

• Today, it fell 9.31 points, or 0.69%.
• Biggest point and percent drop since December 28, 2011.
• Year-to-date, it is up 6.76%.

AP

By Paul Vigna and Chris Dieterich

US stocks have had a few sessions this year where they slipped early in the session, only to see a late rally that pulled them even. Not today.

The major indexes all fall (albeit off session lows) to record their worst one-day loss in this young year.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average loses 89 points (0.7%) to 12801, S&P 500 drops 9 points (0.7%) to 1343 and Nasdaq Comp falls 23 (0.8%) to 2904.

Many point to Greece, but the market’s been overdue for a fall for a while. Still, the picture in Greece is disturbing, and the Argives seem to be barreling toward some kind of default.

That said, this may be long-awaited dip many have been hoping for. The question is will it beckon investors from the sidelines?

“The reality is that a lot of investors are looking for — hoping for — a pullback, and [today] we have some data points that provide it,” says Phil Orlando at Federated Investors, referring to a euro-zone impasse regarding Greece and weaker-than-forecast consumer-sentiment numbers in the US.

“There are a lot of investors that have missed this powerful move, but it’s one of the quietest rallies you’ve never heard of,” he adds, referring to trading volumes. “We could have about a 5% correction over the next few weeks, and that would be healthy. That doesn’t mean the bull market is over.”

By Kevin Kingsbury and Steven Russolillo

Apple has made up nearly half of the fourth-quarter’s earnings growth for the S&P 500 and raised questions in the process of just how healthy the broad corporate-earnings picture is.

More than half of S&P 500 companies have posted results this reporting period, with the earnings growth rate coming in at 8.9%, according to Thomson Reuters. Strip out Apple and the overall growth rate drops to 5.8%.

But JPMorgan’s Thomas Lee takes the stance that such outliers aren’t that uncommon for the benchmark stock index. He says the top 10 contributors to EPS growth for the S&P 500 have added 16% annually since 1990, while the bottom 10 have subtracted 13.5%. Essentially the outliers cancel each other out.

And if you pull out the top 10, earnings would have fallen an average 3.3%, not risen 7% as they otherwise did.

“Apple’s outsize contribution does not make this equity market any less healthy,” Lee says.

Fair enough, but there are other reasons to worry. There have been 52 negative EPS preannouncements for the current quarter, compared to only 20 positive preannouncements, Thomson Reuters says. The ratio of bad outlooks to uplifting views of 2.6 is the weakest since the first quarter of 2009.

To make matters worse, only 63% of S&P 500 companies that have reported this season have posted results above analysts’ expectations, which is the lowest beat rate since the fourth quarter of 2008.

The bulls have been able to hang their hats on strong corporate profits for nearly three years. It’s a stretch to say this reporting season has been weak, but there are several question marks that shouldn’t be ignored over the near term.

• Today Nymex Crude Oil lost $1.17 per barrel, or 1.17%.
• Year-to-date it is down 0.16%.

Comex gold for February delivery lost $14.60 per troy ounce this week, or 0.84% to $1723.30.

• Today Comex Gold lost $15.70 per troy ounce, or 0.90%.
• Year-to-date it is up 10.06%.

Bloomberg News

S&P technical guru Mark Arbeter is calling a market top.

In a note to clients sent this afternoon, Arbeter says the current rally is over and stocks are “vulnerable to a 3% to 5% pullback over the next four weeks or so.”

From Arbeter:

Some of the major indices have moved very close to some of our key technical targets, and at the same time, we’re seeing some frothy sentiment indicators as well as some very overbought price and market internals. Once a potential pullback runs its course, we look for new recovery highs for the market.

Through Thursday’s close, the S&P 500 is up 7.5% this year and has advanced 23% off the early-October lows. It’s been a face-ripping rally in a relatively short time frame, although the pace of the run-up has slowed in recent weeks.

The index hasn’t had a decline greater than 0.6% this year. Unless things change rapidly in the final trading hour (which is always a possibility) the streak is poised to end today as concerns about the status of Greece’s second bailout are worrying investors. The S&P 500 was recently down 0.9% at 1340.

That’s enough of a pullback for Mr. Arbeter to call a near-term top. He sees the S&P 500 tumbling into the 1290 to 1320 range by early March, with tech stocks as the ”most overbought and vulnerable to some profit taking.”

If Arbeter’s script were to play out, he sees the pullback acting as “a very good opportunity to once again raise equity exposure.”

LinkedIn shares are on a tear after the company posted better-than-expected quarterly results and offered an optimistic outlook.

The stock is one of the few bright spots today, rising 17% to $89.06, as the broader market slumps.

Analysts remain generally upbeat about the company’s prospects, although valuation and an upcoming expiration of a lock-up period are the main headwinds for the stock.

LinkedIn went public last May and kicked off a frenzy of tech IPOS, particularly in the social media space, that have generated a mixed reaction among investors. LinkedIn surged during its trading debut and hit $122.70, but it has yet to sniff that level since then.

Other companies such as Pandora, Zynga and Groupon have had more muted responses since going public. Groupon shares slumped yesterday after its first quarterly report as a public company failed to impress investors.

The tech hype will come to a head later this year when Facebook, which has filed to go public, debuts in what should be the largest IPO in US history.

Barclays Capital points out this was LinkedIn’s third quarter it has reported as a public company and results from all three periods have been better than analysts expected. From Barclays:

Key metrics such as corporate customer growth, renewal rates, ARPUs, member growth, member engagement and salesforce productivity were all better than expected. Revenue guidance for 1Q12 and CY12 was roughly in-line and adjusted EBITDA guidance ~10% above, but investors are becoming accustomed to management’s conservatism, and we believe there could potentially be further upside.

Jefferies weighs in on the upcoming lock-up expiration:

The 90-day lock-up will expire on 2/14/2012, with a total of 55M shares. The majority (~48M) of these are owned by three insiders/institutional owners who are likely more committed to being LT holders. While some shares are bound to come to market ST, their impact should be more muted than the last lock-up.

And Evercore Partners maintains an equal-weight rating, reflecting a “degree of conservatism given valuation:

The company is on a very solid growth trajectory, which this quarter’s revenue performance amply demonstrated. However, we contend that our above-guidance estimates already account for a very robust outlook. In other words, while we recognize the beat in justifying higher value, we still find current valuation as challenging to justify, so to speak. Therefore, we would await a more attractive entry point.

The Fed isn’t exactly a subject that lends itself to easily to humor, but the Fed and Valentine’s Day? You’re right, it’s even less funny, unless you get all the economics geeks on Twitter to turn #FedValentines into one of the top trending subjects of the day.

Justin Wolfers, an economics professor at Wharton and the closest thing the profession has to a certified hipster, started the meme this morning, and it picked up steam faster than a bank run. Some of the tweets are clever, some are poetic, some are filthy, some aren’t even funny and others don’t even have anything to do with the Fed. Here’s just a couple of the literally hundreds of tweets:

@alanbeattie: I’d like to borrow you overnight and then hold you to maturity

@prajwalciryam Let ours a happy monetary union be/When the markets start to seize/In your strength, FOMC/Deliver us, with quantitative ease.

@planetmoney But, soft! What light through yonder discount window breaks? It is the East, and Ben is the sun.

@fdoosey My dear, I have tickets to that new play “All’s Well That Ends In A Food Riot”

The Fed itself took notice, and in a rather uncharacteristic move for a staid bank, even joined in on the fun:

@sffedreserve: My love is elastic, my commitment too big to fail

Now, some of the staffers here at the Journal have gotten into the act, too (but only on our lunch break, of course.)

@jasonzweigwsj Every moment I think of you makes me want to chirp, since nothing my returns can do would happen without your ZIRP

@paulvigna I will remit all my love to your Treasury.

Happy Valentine’s Day, Chairman Bernanke. You had us at QE1 (that’s from @planetmoney, too.)

P.S. The headline of this post was one of the #FedValentines tweets as well, but we’ve lost track of the author. Apologies. UPDATE: AFP reporter @AndrewBeatty gets props for the headline.

Benjamin Segal, portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman International Fund, highlights some of the opportunities he’s tracking in more global companies as opposed to domestic stocks. His take:

The FTSE 100, which is largely comprised of global companies, is trading at a discount to the S&P and offers a higher yield. The CAC 40 is comprised mostly of global companies and is least expensive on a P/E basis and has the highest dividend yield.

Here’s a chart from Mr. Segal:

Reuters

Major stock indexes have slumped about 1% in this morning’s trade as worries about Greece have, yet again, spread across trading desks.

As we pointed out this morning the market has been resilient throughout 2012, overcoming early intraday losses on many occasions and finishing higher. Whether the market can maintain that pattern and recover from this morning’s losses will be a key test of resilience.

Don’t hold your breath, says the chart watchers at Instinet.

“While the Bulls were able to reverse another weak opening yesterday, the momentum powering the move was noticeably weaker than in the prior four sessions,” Instinet says.

The firm also points out the S&P 500 has risen in six out of the last seven days, which “leaves the system vulnerable to a negative catalyst.” In this case, the rejection of Greece’s austerity plan is acting as the driver for today’s action.

European markets, which closed a few minutes ago, suffered broad losses. The Stoxx Europe 600 declined about 0.9%, while Germany’s DAX dropped 1.4% and the France CAC 40 fell 1.5%.

The S&P 500 was recently down 11 points, or 0.8%, at 1341.

Instinet says there have been five early-session losses this year in which the S&P 500 declined by more than 10 points. In four of those instances, the declines were reversed by at least 1.2 by the close.

“Doing it again could be difficult.”