Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) was cut to Market Perform from outperform at KBW.

Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (NASDAQ: BBBY) was cut to Hold from Buy at Jefferies.

BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) was cut to Market Perform from Outperform at KBW.

Brinker International Inc. (NYSE: EAT) was cut to Market Perform from outperform at Wells Fargo.

Charles Schwab Corp. (NYSE: SCHW) was cut to Underperform from Market Perform at KBW.

Kansas City Southern Corp. (NYSE: KSU) was cut to Sell from Hold at Stifel Nicolaus.

Leap Wireless Inc. (NASDAQ: LEAP) was cut to Sell from an already cautious Hold rating at Deutsche Bank.

Lowe’s Companies Inc. (NYSE: LOW) was cut to Perform from outperform at Oppenheimer.

NeuStar Inc. (NYSE: NSR) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Goldman Sachs.

Red Hat Inc. (NYSE: RHT) was cut to Market Perform from Outperform BMO Capital.

Ruby Tuesday Inc. (NYSE: RT) was cut to Market Perform from Outperform at Wells Fargo.

SanDisk Corp. (NASDAQ: SNDK) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Nomura.

TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. (NYSE: AMTD) was cut to Underperform from Market Perform at KBW.

See also: Top Analyst Upgrades and Positive Calls This Monday

Yesterday’s announcement that Fannie Mae would repay $59.4 billion in bailout funds spiked our interest in how the TARP payback is going. Here is what we have found.

The Capital Purchase Program was the largest of the TARP programs, paying out $250.46 billion to 707 financial institutions. The total amount repaid so far comes to $270.81 billion. Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) took TARP funds of $45 billion and fully repaid the funds in early 2010. Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) and Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC) paid back TARP loans of $20 billion and $25 billion, respectively, in early 2010 as well. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) repaid $25 billion in the summer of 2009, and Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS) repaid $10 billion each at the same time.

In addition to these repayments, the Treasury received dividend payments of nearly $12 billion on from the Capital Purchase Program, some $9.4 billion from banks with assets greater than $10 billion.

Smaller banks received $14.57 billion in TARP funds and have repaid $12.13 billion so far, including $1.63 billion in dividends.

American International Group Inc. (NYSE: AIG) received $67.84 billion in TARP funds and has repaid $55.31 billion to date, include $640 million dividends.

The U.S. auto industry received a total of $79.69 billion. Chrysler Group received $12.37 billion and has repaid $11.13 billion to date, including $1.13 billion in interest. General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) received $51.03 billion and has so far repaid $31.1 billion, including $770 million in interest. Ally Financial, formerly GMAC, received $16.29 billion and has repaid $5.94 billion, including $3.27 billion in dividends. As a group, the automakers and Ally have repaid $48.17 billion of the original bailout funds.

The out-of-pocket cost to taxpayers as of yesterday totaled $42.29 billion, and collections are continuing. That’s not exactly chump change, but in late 2008 no one would have dared predict that TARP would end up costing that little.

See the U.S. Treasury’s daily report.

General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) short interest rose 14% to 94.25 million shares. About 0.9% of GE’s float is now short.

Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) saw short interest fall by 20.8% to 206.34 million shares, about 5.5% of the company’s total float.

Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) short interest fell 2.1% to 164.26 million shares, which represents 1.5% of the company’s float.

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) saw a 1.5% rise in short interest to 52.2 million shares, which represents about 1.8% of the firm’s float.

Alpha Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE: ANR) showed a rise of 13.1% in short interest, to 33.02 million shares, about 13.4% of Alpha’s float.

McDonald’s Corp. (NYSE: MCD) showed a drop of 2.8% in short interest, to 11 million shares, about 15.1% of the company’s float.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) saw short interest rise by 107.2% to 41.59 million shares, or 2.4% of the company’s float.

BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY) saw short interest rise by 0.2% to 164.69 million shares, or 33.3% of the total float.

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) posted a 16.3% drop in short interest, to 99.42 million shares, about 1.3% of Microsoft’s float.

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) short interest declined by 7.2%, to 22.35 million shares or about 1.5% of the company’s float.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) saw short interest decrease by 2.1% to 31.58 million shares or 26% of the company’s float.

Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) saw short interest rise by 1.2% to 58.7 million shares or about 1.1% of the company’s float.

The most interesting changes in this two-week period are the declines in short interest in Nokia, BlackBerry and Microsoft, as well as the concomitant doubling of short interest in Apple. That is a pretty clear indication that investors are betting that three players in the mobile sector are about to put more pressure on the sector leader.

Short interest in Dell declined for the third period in a row. It will be interesting to see if today’s offer from Carl Icahn and Southeastern Capital Management moves the needle at all. The new offer is certainly not one that cannot be refused.

This is an interesting take because it has yet another call to increase the capitalization of the so-called too big to fail banks. It sound great and 24/7 Wall St. is all in favor of big banks being on solid ground. The ultimate problem is that the big banks are so big that increase their capitalization requirements effectively withdraws too much capital from the economy.  It is without any doubt that you have heard of the calls to break apart the big banks before. You will here those same calls tomorrow and beyond as well.

When you consider that a mere handful of banks have about half of the country’s personal and commercial bank deposits you have a right to be scared. Increasing the capital requirements above the 10% hurdles set by Basel banking standards. Imagine how strong and able these banks would be able to hold up in another recession if their bank capital requirements went from 10% to say 15%.   Now for the bad news if you look at the tally of assets as of the end of 2012. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) was about $2.36 trillion in assets and Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) has $2.2 trillion in assets, with Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) behind it at $1.86 trillon and then followed by $1.42 trillion for Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC).

These four banks alone have $7.84 trillion in assets. The CIA World Factbook tracks just about all global economies and its final estimate for 2012 GDP was put at $15.66 trillion for 2012. Different regulators have many different means of calculating what they think the capitalization are best and keeping up with the flavor of the day or week is for government accountants and regulators. Still, this asset base for just the four biggest banks is right at half (actually 50.06%) of 2012 GDP on the purchasing power parity calculation preferred by economists.

It is very easy to merely say in a vacuum that the too big to fail banks should just increase their capital to hedge against future bailouts. Various regulators have various means of evaluating capitalization metrics and requirements. The unfortunate outcome is that by forcing banks to hold even more capital will tighten credit even further than it has been. With much of the world back in recession, that puts the U.S. back in recession.

Here is what Mr. Plosser said,

“Today, I will highlight why I think current efforts may not be sufficient and discuss a two-pronged approach to ending the problem of too big to fail. The first aspect of this approach is establishing a framework that permits a large financial institution to, in fact, fail without placing the financial system at risk. Large financial firms, and particularly their creditors, should not be rescued or protected by government guarantees or supports or by regulatory discretion. The second line of defense that I will discuss is to expect all financial firms to maintain sufficient levels of capital to significantly reduce the ex-ante risk of failure. Increased capital requirements can lower the incentive for financial institutions to become systemically important and lower the probability that such firms will fail in the first place.”

There is an admission that these “TBTF” banks would become less systemically important. We have no problem with the notion that 20 of the top 50 banks should be allowed to grow and take assets from the top 4. The question is how you can do it without creating a recession. No one seems to have the stomach to actually break apart these businesses. Merely lifting capital reserve requirements comes with a serious price due to the economies of scale here.

Finally, just imagine breaking all of these big banks up as the ultimate step that many people would like to see. This would be very messy and would likely throw the economy back into a self-imposed recession. At first there would be many layoffs and many immediate hits in the economy. That would likely reverse itself and perhaps in as short as one or two quarters of the year. During that period of chaos, businesses would have limited access to capital again just like in 2008 and 2009 at the same time that individuals would not be able to easily get mortgages and loans. The list of problems can just go on and on even though we agree that the big banks are just too big and too economically important.

It is easy for politicians and regulators to propose more strict and tighter standards. As you can see, the actual path to take is harder to walk down than it is to talk about. If you do not believe that there would not be real problems here, ask yourself why the moves have been so slow even after the financial crisis. Even with the anti-money sentiment that much of the public and their elected officials have today, the powers that be must also believe that the price to pay would be too costly.

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) plans to upgrade Windows 8 to boost sales. (Reuters)

New York state will file charges against Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) and Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC) over mortgage instrument abuses. (Reuters)

Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: EA) and Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) set a partnership for Star Wars games. (Reuters)

Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) makes changes to its Atom chip in a bid for more mobile sales. (Reuters)

The Securities and Exchange Commission charges officials of Harrisburg with misrepresenting the city’s financial state. (WSJ)

Bank of America pays MBIA Inc. (NYSE: MBI) $1.7 billion to settle mortgage-related charges. (WSJ)

European Union officials issue a complaint against Google Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Motorola over its patent violations of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) intellectual property. (WSJ)

The three largest J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) investors fail to support the plan to allow Jamie Dimon to keep both his chief executive and chairman roles. (WSJ)

San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera sues Monster Beverage Corp. (NASDAQ: MNST) over sales of its drinks to underage children. (WSJ)

The European Union will put tariffs on Chinese solar panels. (WSJ)

Some telecom companies adopt mobile OS products that compete with Apple’s iOS and Google Android. (WSJ)

To fight online sales of fake drugs, among other things, Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) will sell Viagra online. (NYT)

Foxconn, a major Apple supplier, begins to manufacture its own TVs. (NYT)

Google’s YouTube will allow some providers of content to charge subscription fees. (NYT)

Slow increases in health care costs could be due to the recession and higher co-pay charges. (NYT)

Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) will introduce video ads. (FT)

Swiss unemployment reaches a two-year high. (Bloomberg)

The U.S. dollar index is trading up 23% today, now at 82.313. The GSCI commodity index is up 1.4% at 631.08. WTI crude oil closed up 0.6%, at $96.16 a barrel, although we continue to look for prices to fall (more coverage here). Brent crude trades up 1.2% at $105.40 a barrel. Natural gas is down 0.7% today at about $4.01 per million BTUs. Gold settled up 0.3% today at $1,468.00.

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA down about 4 points to 14,969.50 (-0.03%), the NASDAQ rose more than 14 points (0.42%) to 3,392.97, and the S&P 500 rose 0.19% or about 3 points to 1,617.51.

There were a several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including:

• Banco Santander (NYSE: SAN) cut to ‘sell’ at Citigroup;
• Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria S.A. (NYSE: BBVA) cut to ‘sell’ at Citigroup;
• Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE: CLF) raised to ‘outperform’ at FBR Capital Markets;
• Humana Inc. (NYSE: HUM) raised to ‘overweight’ at J.P. Morgan; and
• YRC Worldwide Inc. (NASDAQ: YRCW) raised to ‘hold’ at BB&T Capital.

Earnings reports since markets closed last Friday resulted in some price moves today, including these as of the last half hour of trading:

• Apollo Global Management LLC (NYSE: APO) is up 0.8% at $26.80 after posting a new 52-week high of $28.14 earlier today;
• Bridgepoint Education Inc. (NYSE: BPi) is down 0.9% at $10.91;
• Sysco Corp. (NYSE: SYY) is down 0.9% at $34.34; and
• Westlake Chemical Corp. (NYSE: WLK) is up 7.9% at $88.97 (more coverage here).

Before markets open tomorrow morning we are scheduled to hear earnings reports from Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (NYSE: APC), First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR), Plains All American Pipeline LP (NYSE: PAA) (more pipelines coverage here), Vornado Realty Trust (NYSE: VNO), Carrizo Oil & Gas Inc. (NASDAQ: CRZO), Checkpoint Systems Inc. (NYSE: CKP), DirecTV (NASDAQ: DTV), and Fossil Inc. (NASDAQ: FOSL).

Some standouts among heavily traded stocks today include:

MBIA Inc. (NYSE: MBI) is up 42.3% at $13.99. The insurer reached a settlement with Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) related to mortgage securities that went bad during the financial crisis.

Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) is down 6.3% at $5.47. The daily deals company is expected to miss estimates by at least one broker when it reports results on Wednesday .

Linn Energy LLC (NASDAQ: LINE) is down 6% at $35.45 after posting a new 52-week low of $34.27 earlier today. The independent oil & gas producer got a poor write-up in Barron’s magazine over the weekend.

Stay tuned for Tuesday. We have noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 11:30 a.m. – 4-week bill auction
• 1:00 p.m. – 3-year note auction
• 3:00 p.m. – Consumer credit

The key trend is that companies still are managing to meet or beat earnings expectations. Corporate revenues are coming in soft, to the point that the concerns cannot just be ignored. These soft revenue reports are even after many analysts had lowered sales expectations ahead of and during earnings season.

We have just lowered our own forecast for the payrolls expectations with unemployment this Friday, following weaker TrimTabs payrolls and ADP payrolls reports. Even construction spending is starting to cool off. Market technician Carter Worth of Oppenheimer recently indicated on CNBC that the market is even more bifurcated than it has been in the past going into this May cycle.

One bit of good news may be that Merrill Lynch sees several breakout stocks despite the Sell in May history. We are growing more concerned that companies are lowering their expectations for sales in the rest of 2013. Europe keeps reporting lower and lower growth, or worse outright worse into recession territory. Japan’s only saving grace is coming from a massive stimulus package from the Bank of Japan under Abe.

Our take is that the easier earnings and sales growth cycle has peaked, at the same time that the stock market is up well above 10% after the first 4 months of the year. The stock market is supposed to be a voting proxy for what things will look like six months or so into the future. And long-term bond yields are hitting back at very low levels rather than rising. At some point, investors may not be able to stomach the valuations they are paying for these so-called defensive stocks and for high-yield dividends that are getting less high by the day. Junk bonds just hit another cycle low, and we even called it a crush-depth valuation.

We are now already at about 70% of the S&P 500 Index companies that have reported. What are we supposed to consider when growth is anemic on earnings and sales growth is nonexistent? We now may be facing only 2.5% or 3% earnings growth ahead, depending upon which source you are focusing on.  The risks ahead are combined for big multinational players because of a high dollar value and weak organic demand from Europe and Asia.

General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) was perhaps the biggest disappointment to us this whole earnings season if its drop was “only” about 10% from peak to trough. GE is the best yield of the DJIA conglomerates but shares were shelled after earnings. International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM) is also showing no sales growth at all, and its “high” dividend hike was actually a severe disappointment to us. Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT) has limited growth as well, and the only good news here on its earnings was that it was at least anticipated. Even United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX) has taken it on the chin. More concern came in Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) and in J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) now that we have seen a serious bank call that the best has been seen for 2013 from financials. And what are you supposed to make of it if Alcoa Inc. (NYSE: AA) is out yet again looking to cut capacity even further that will result in layoffs.

The lower copper and oil prices have to be considered as well, as they signal economic weakness ahead. Oil inventories just came in at the highest reading ever since they started tracking them.

Investors keep buying up stocks. Maybe that will continue, but the strong performance at some point has to be based upon something more than that the Fed and Treasury will keep the money cheap and keep the asset buying and quantitative easing measures around perpetually.

Read Also: Biotech Bubble Against Big Pharma Valuations?

What is funny is that we here are not really scared of stocks and valuations in many instances. The problem is that this is very selective and there are many cross currents that do not add up in a logical manner for value investors right now. Maybe the ISM forecast of the U.S. avoiding a 2013 recession and a surprising rise of consumer confidence are all that really matter ahead for the bulls.

General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) short interest rose 4.8% to 82.7 million shares. About 0.8% of GE’s float is now short.

Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) saw short interest fall by 12.8% to 260.55 million shares, about 7% of the company’s total float.

Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) short interest rose 7.1% to 167.8 million shares, which represents 1.6% of the company’s float.

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) saw a 10.8% drop in short interest to 51.42 million shares, which represents about 1.8% of the firm’s float.

Alpha Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE: ANR) showed a rise of 4.8% in short interest, to 29.19 million shares, about 13.4% of Alpha’s float.

McDonald’s Corp. (NYSE: MCD) showed a drop of 2.8% in short interest, to 11 million shares, about 1.1% of the company’s float.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) saw short interest rise by 0.3% to 20.01 million shares, or 2.1% of the company’s float.

BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY) saw short interest rise by 5.6% to 164.34 million shares, or 33.2% of the total float. Short interest continues to be reported under the company’s previous name, Research in Motion Ltd., but the stock symbol has been changed to BBRY.

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) posted a 9.9% rise in short interest, to 118.71 million shares, about 1.6% of Microsoft’s float.

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) short interest declined by 18.7%, to 24.09 million shares or about 1.6% of the company’s float.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) saw short interest decrease by 6.3% to 32.25 million shares or 26.5% of the company’s float.

Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) saw short interest rise by 7.7% to 58 million shares or about 1.1% of the company’s float.

Short interest in Dell has declined by double-digit percentages for the past two reports. Competition to the bid from Michael Dell and his partners, once believed to be strong enough to push the stock price higher, had begun to evaporate a few weeks ago and now that one competitive bidder has withdrawn the shares trade once again right around the level of the original take-private bid.

Short interest in Microsoft was rising following reports on weakness in the PC market. The shorts likely will have bailed out by the next short interest report, now that the company has posted solid earnings for the first quarter.

And in the smartphone market, the drop in Nokia’s short interest could indicate that traders see the company getting some benefit from Apple’s perceived woes. BlackBerry, where a third of the shares are now short, has few believers left in its ability to recover.

Some of the issues are very focused for investors. Fitch showed that overall revenues broadly fell for the large U.S. banks even though net income improved on a linked-quarter basis. Lower provision expenses and cost controls managed to mitigate poor revenue figures. While expected, Fitch also said that a decline in mortgage refinancing activities managed to helped bank earnings. Fitch did signal that it now expects mortgage revenues to decline throughout the banking sector in 2013 due to lower refinancing activities. Here were some additional points made:

top five U.S. banks showed capital market activity aggregate revenues were 7% below a strong first quarter 2012, but were up 36% above the seasonally weaker fourth quarter in 2012. Capital markets were also shown to be a key contributor to overall revenues for the top five at 35% of consolidated revenues. Fixed income, currencies, and commodities activity were the largest segments of the capital markets.

Additional concerns were brought up around the balance of accruing troubled debt restructurings on balance sheets. The legal and regulatory costs also remain elevated. We would add to what Fitch said here by pointing out that Jamie Dimon of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) warned in his most recent annual letter to shareholders that more regulatory actions against the banks (or his bank) would be coming down the pipe.

Fitch even said, “Earnings for U.S. banks generally improved during the first quarter although these levels will be difficult to sustain over the remainder of 2013… The first quarter is generally the strongest period, and the industry still faces unpredictability on capital markets revenues and earnings.”

We did note in our own analyst upgrades and downgrades this morning that there were two dissenting upgrades which may take a 180-degree turn from Fitch’s note. Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) was raised to Overweight from Equal Weight and its target price was raised to $16 from $13 by the analyst team at Morgan Stanley. We also saw that Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) was raised to Buy from Neutral with a $25 price target at SunTrust Robinson Humphreys.

The 2013 primer for “Sell in May and Go Away!” will be more concise and quick-hit. More detailed and recent background data is available in links, for a broader, fresh reading on each point.

Maybe this really was supposed to be a “Sell in April” call as the markets have become choppy after huge gains. Investors have high profits that they can still lock in, but many investors still have managed to miss the bull market without making much in profits outside of their bond funds. Due to attempts to chase returns and to catch up on missing five years of retirement investing, the first quarter saw record inflows of capital into stock funds, if you measure the past decade or so. The fact that interest is being rekindled in stocks actually may lead to some stabilizing support in May, even if the economic data remains spotty to cautious.

Corporate earnings are coming out mixed. The overall focus of just earnings and guidance is positive on the bottom line, but revenue growth for the major companies remains stodgy and hard to find this year. Weak international markets and emerging markets are playing into that, as is the rising value of the U.S. dollar relative to other currencies.

Economic readings are showing only modest growth or contraction. If you have looked at the various purchasing managers’ index readings and the regional Federal Reserve and regional economic reports, the sentiment is either in the red, showing contraction, or growth that remains so low that it might as well be contraction.

Europe remains a serious point of weakness. Somehow the tiny banking island nation of Cyprus managed to dwarf the problems of Greece, Italy and elsewhere. Now we have France effectively in a recession again, and Germany’s reports are teetering back to recessionary levels. If these readings do not improve, then growth forecasts for later in 2013 will revert to recessionary projections. That is bad for exporters. The U.K. even lost another Triple-A rating.

China and emerging markets are less than robust. The recent International Monetary Fund and other international meetings point to emerging markets not being strong enough to support their internal growth projections. Growth in Brazil and Russia may be better than in India, but the whole BRIC complex is running below its capabilities. China has been called the growth engine of the world but it also is showing more manufacturing weakness as well.

Consumers are facing pressure. Weaker consumer sentiment has come after the start of higher taxes, but commodities may help stabilize the bleeding. Consumers have had to face higher payroll taxes and higher food prices. Overall inflation is tame. This is hurting sentiment and some spending measurements. The good news here is that lower oil prices will save consumers directly at the pump, which helps them have more spending money for restaurants, entertainment and other consumer spending issues. If oil prices remain low, this may be a stabilizing force against what would otherwise be a less than robust consumer. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT), Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT) and even Costco Wholesale Corp. (NASDAQ: COST) are all within 1% or so of multiyear highs in their share prices.

Broader economic barometer companies are faltering. Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT) showed serious concerns about the year ahead for pre-infrastructure and mining outfits. The only saving graces were that investors already were figuring this into the share price and that the company will spend up to $1 billion to repurchase shares on the cheap. General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) managed to meet many expectations, but this one had run up and valuation met what is obviously going to be slower growth ahead for this economic bellwether as well.

Banking excitement has petered out. The post-earnings reaction to banks has not carried the 2012 excitement much further into 2013. It is getting harder to find the same enthusiasm around Bank of America Corp (NYSE: BAC) and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM). Even a discount to book value argument has not yet handily changed after about four years of recovery. Jamie Dimon even warned of more regulatory action ahead.

Technology is waning for the bulls. The good news is that Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) managed to hold up better than expected after earnings. The bad news is that Windows 8 has been partially blamed for a weak PC sales cycle that was the worst in years so far. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has lost its way and wrecked many investor fortunes who wanted to chase what was supposed to be a sure thing. International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM) showed not just that it had little growth, but contraction. It simply may have run out of room to grow.

Metals have been serious points of weakness. Both have hit multiyear lows, but gold has wrecked more market-oriented finances and weak miner trends may imply that gold has not found a new investor base yet. Copper forecasts have come down due to the global demand and supply issues, and copper is arguably one of the biggest leading indicators of them all for emerging market and Chinese expansion. Elsewhere in metals, Alcoa Inc. (NYSE: AA) manages to keep selling a very slow and targeted turnaround story, and its shares are still lower than before its recent earnings and guidance.

A Recent History of “Sell in May and Go Away!”

At the end of April of 2012, there was a long road of political hate ahead of the U.S. presidential election, with an economy that was still sluggish but avoiding recession. The labor data was still choppy, with unemployment at about 8.2% due to lower labor force participation rates. Earnings growth was slowing then as well, and Europe was actually even more of a concern in 2012 than it is in 2013. The good news is that equity values were attractive and the FOMC still had more quantitative easing measures in its pocket at the time, with the pledge of maintaining an “exceptionally low rate policy” through the end of 2014.

The year 2011 felt close to a repeat of 2010, with the worries not just about the PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece, Spain), but about the possibilities of a U.S. debt rating downgrade, which did ultimately come. Housing was still in the tank and employment was not yet in a full-blown recovery in America. While the end of April to the end of May did see a drop of 800 points in the DJIA, from almost 12,900 in late April and early May to just above 12,000 by late May and 11,900 by late June, it was late July and August that were the cruel months for the DJIA as companies began to suffer serious earnings concerns. The DJIA bottomed out just under 10,600 in August. By late October the market was back above 12,000 again.

But 2009 was a very different year because the market was recovering from the crash and stocks were still benefitting from that move. Summer of 2010 has a nasty start as investors worried about a double-dip recession, as housing prices continued to sink and unemployment was still a prime concern. We also faced that punishing event called the “Flash Crash.” Another big distraction was BP PLC (NYSE: BP), for its disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, and America and the rest of the world was starting to consider some problems in nations called the PIIGS. The market peaked around 11,300 in late April and had sunk to a 9,800 by early May. Even around July 6, the DJIA was only near 10,200, and it was only back up to almost 10,500 after the end of August around Labor Day.