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Is everyone ready for the weekend? Or, in some cases, is everyone bundled up for the weekend? A bunch of us have been hit by unusually cold temperatures and more than a little snow, and though most of it's gone, there's still a little more of the same in store for the next couple of days. Ugh.

Anyway, we didn't want to talk about the weather today. That's what meteorologists are for. We're here to talk about the market's trend, some major economic news unveiled today (yes, the unemployment picture), and answer a reader's question.

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Congratulations to those who had the fortitude to step into a new long/bullish trade late on Tuesday or early on Wednesday, and then had the fortitude to stick with that trade. You're now up pretty nicely, for a two-day holding period. Gotta be honest though... I've got some concerns about the over-exuberant nature of the rally thus far.

I know, I know - I've got "concerns" every day, most of which seem unnecessary. I'm ok with that. I'd rather explain to you everything that could go wrong with the market that doesn't rather than not explain all the risks and leave you a little shellshocked on the occasion things do go wrong.

Anyway, my concern for you today isn't a horrifying one. I've said all along I don't think a bear market or a recession are on the horizon. My only worry is that stocks are overbought and overvalued and in need of a corrective move. The only thing worth exploring today is how once again the market jumped so sharply that it left itself nowhere (meaningful) to go. The potentially-disruptive force in our analysis of the current situation is the looming advent of earnings season, which is going to force investors to deal with the nagging valuation problem I've been on the soapbox about for a while.

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Happy hump-day, friends and fellow traders. As we expected, stocks bounced firmly on Wednesday, ending a five-day losing streak that pulled the S&P 500 lower to the tune of 4.2%. As we warned you in Tuesday's newsletter though, one good day after five horrible days for the market doesn't mean the short-term downtrend has been snapped.

We'll give you our usual reality check on the broad market below. There are actually a handful of items we need to cross off our "to do" list first, like showing you the only stable, trustworthy group of stocks out there right now.

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Welcome back, everybody. How was your weekend?

If you were expecting normal trading to resume this week after last week's lull, you've probably realized by now it's not going to happen. Though Monday's volume was a little stronger than Friday's volume, that's not saying much - it was still on the thin side. I doubt we'll see any significant perk-up later this week either.

See, markets are closed on Thursday in observance of New Year's Day, which means the day before is going to be a tepid day as well, as traders tend to make New Year's Eve a holiday too even though the market is open a full day on Wednesday. A lot of traders think it's also somewhat pointless to come back for just one trading day between a holiday and a weekend, so Friday's apt to be tepid too. That leaves today and Tuesday as the only viable trading days for the week, and considering the way the holidays fell on the calendar this year, it's likely a bunch of the regular trading crowd isn't going to bother checking in at all this week. In fact, Monday's lethargy pretty much confirms a large degree of disinterest at this point, which doesn't bode well for Tuesday's action.

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Welcome back from the day off, and welcome to the weekend! We know Friday wasn't a big day for stock trading - it's just the way the holiday fell this year. We've still got a handful of things we want to get through today, however, if only to make sure we're all prepared for next week's action. All the same, you'll find today's edition is a little shorter than the norm just because we don't see any need to make a mountain out of a molehill.

No need to tarry.... let's just dig in, beginning with a quick look at the top commentaries posted at the website today.