Aetna Inc. (NYSE: AET) was reinstated as Buy at Goldman Sachs.

American Tower Corp. (NYSE: AMT) was raised to Outperform from Neutral at Macquarie.

BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) was raised to Outperform from Neutral at Macquarie.

Cray Inc. (NASDAQ: CRAY) was started as Buy with $25 price target at Stern Agee.

Cubist Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: CBST) was raised to Hold from Sell at Cantor Fitzgerald.

Hasbro Inc. (NASDAQ: HAS) started as Overweight at Piper Jaffray.

IntercontinentalExchange Inc. (NYSE: ICE) was raised to Outperform from Neutral at Macquarie.

LeapFrog Enterprises Inc. (NYSE: LF) was started as Overweight at Piper Jaffray.

Mattel Inc. (NASDAQ: MAT) started as Overweight at Piper Jaffray.

Sony Corp. (NYSE: SNE) was started as Buy at Jefferies.

Stifel Financial Corp. (NYSE: SF) was raised to Market Perform from Underperform at Wells Fargo.

Goldman Sachs has raised its 2013 S&P 500 price target to 1,750 from 1,625, and it raised the S&P 500 price target for 2014 to 1,900 from 1,775.

See also: Merrill Lynch Recommends Specialty Metals and Mining Stocks to Buy

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

BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Citigroup.

Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (NASDAQ: CLNE) was cut to Underperform from Market Perform at Raymond James.

Guess? Inc. (NYSE: GES) was cut to Neutral from Outperform at Wedbush Morgan.

LivePerson Inc. (NASDAQ: LPSN) was cut to Underperform from an already cautious Neutral rating at Credit Suisse.

Rackspace Hosting Inc. (NYSE: RAX) did see one upgrade based on valuation, but after missing its earnings estimates we see the shares down big (20% or so) and several analyst downgrades. Evercore, RBC, FBN and CLSA all downgraded the Rackers. Canaccord Genuity even took its target all the way down to $40

Tesla Motors Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Goldman Sachs after a very positive pop in the stock from a consumer report. Shares are up 22% at over $68 for a record share price.

Tim Hortons Inc. (NYSE: THI) was cut to Equal Weight from Overweight at Barclays, although this was raised to Outperform at CIBC.

Transmontaigne Partners L.P. (NYSE: TLP) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch.

Tumi Holdings Inc. (NYSE: TUMI) was cut to Neutral from Buy at Citigroup.

One standout will come from the top analyst picks for May of stocks expected to rise by 40% to 100%.

See also: Top Analyst Upgrades and Positive Calls This Thursday

The U.S. dollar index is trading down 0.81% today, now at 81.752. The GSCI commodity index is down 2.3% at 608.83 (more commodities coverage here). WTI crude oil closed up 0.1% today, at $88.81 a barrel. Brent crude trades down 1% at $99.63 a barrel, its first dip below $100 a barrel since last July. Natural gas is up 0.9% today at about $4.16 per million BTUs. Gold settled up 1.9% today at $1,387.40 an ounce, following the yesterday’s drop of 9.3%.

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA up more than 157 points to 14,756.70 (1.08%), the NASDAQ rose more than 48 points (1.50%) to 3,264.63, and the S&P 500 rose 1.43% or more than 22 points to 1,574.56.

There were a several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including Costco Wholesale Corp. (NASDAQ: COST) started as ‘buy’ at UBS; Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) raised to ‘overweight’ at J.P. Morgan and reiterated as ‘buy’ with a price target of $8 at Argus; First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) reiterated as ‘hold’ at Argus; Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) raised to ‘overweight’ at Morgan Stanley; and American Electric Power Co. (NYSE: AEP) cut to ‘market perform’ at Wells Fargo.

Earnings reports since markets closed last night resulted in some price moves today, including these as of the last half hour of trading: Pep Boys – Manny, Moe & Jack (NYSE: PBY) is down 6.2% at $10.55; BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) is up 0.9% at $256.20; Comerica Inc. (NYSE: CMA) is up 2% at $34.83; Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS) is down 1.8% at $143.88 (more coverage here); Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) is up 2.2% at $83.47 after posting a new 52-week high of $83.54 earlier today (more coverage here); and The Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO) is up 5.9% at $42.46 after posting a new 52-week high of $42.47 earlier today (more coverage here).

Before markets open tomorrow morning we are scheduled to hear earnings reports from CSX Corp. (NYSE: CSX), Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), United Rentals Inc. (NYSE: URI), and Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO).

Some standouts among heavily traded stocks today include:

J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP) is up 6.1% at $15.27. The struggling retailer saw its shares rise on reports that it was looking at borrowing against its substantial real estate holdings and even other ways to raise cash based on the dirt underneath the stores.

Barrick Gold Corp. (NYSE: ABX) is down 5.3% at $18.74 after posting a second consecutive 52-week low of $18.66 earlier today. The gold mining company continues to be weighed down by the decline in gold prices. Other gold miners continue to suffer as well.

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) is up 3.8% at $46.60. The big bank’s positive earnings results yesterday, especially the improvement in its credit losses, gained more favor today.

Stay tuned for Wednesday. Fed Governor Jeremy Stein, St. Louis Fed President James Bullard, and Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren are giving speeches. We have also noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 7:00 a.m. – Mortgage Bankers Association purchase applications
• 10:30 a.m. – EIA weekly petroleum status report
• 2:00 p.m. – Federal Reserve Beige Book

The U.S. dollar index is trading up 0.10% today, now at 82.387. The GSCI commodity index is down 1.3% at 623.16. WTI crude oil closed down 2.8% today, at $88.71 a barrel, its lowest level of the year. Brent crude trades down 2.6% at $100.45 a barrel. The crude market was exceptionally hard hit today (more coverage here). Natural gas is down 1.7% today at about $4.13 per million BTUs. Gold settled down 9.3% today at $1,361.10 an ounce, following the largest one-day drop in 30 years and the lowest settlement in more than 2 years..

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA down about 201 points to 14,664.27 (-1.79%), the NASDAQ fell more than 78 points (-2.38%) to 3,216.49, and the S&P 500 fell -2.30% or more than 36 points to 1,552.38.

There were a several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. (NYSE: CMG) raised to ‘buy’ at UBS; Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (NYSE: FCX) cut to ‘sell’ at Citigroup; Saks Inc. (NYSE: SKS) cut to ‘neutral’ at J.P. Morgan; Gold Fields Inc. (NYSE: GFI) raised to ‘neutral’ at Citigroup; and Goldman Sachs GRoup Inc. (NYSE: GS) started as ‘market perform’ at KBW.

Earnings reports since markets closed last Friday resulted in some price moves today, including these as of the last half hour of trading: Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) is up 0.7% at $45.10 (more coverage here); The Charles Schwab Corp. (NYSE: SCHW) is down 3.9% at $16.61; and First Republic Bank (NYSE: FRC) is down 4.1% at $38.36.

Before markets open tomorrow morning we are scheduled to hear earnings reports from Pep Boys – Manny, Moe & Jack (NYSE: PBY), BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK), Comerica Inc. (NYSE: CMA), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS), Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ), and The Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO).

Some standouts among heavily traded stocks today include:

Spring Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) is up 13.9% at $7.08 after posting a new 52-week high of $7.33 earlier today. The wireless carrier received a $25.5 billion offer from Dish Network Corp. (NASDAQ: DISH) this morning, more than $5 billion more than the offer from Softbank now under consideration. More coverage here.

Barrick Gold Corp. (NYSE: ABX) is down 11.9% at $19.93 after posting a new 52-week low of $19.86 earlier today. The gold mining company — and virtually every mining company — was hit hard today by the collapse in gold prices. Barrick also fell 8.5% on Friday. More coverage here.

Life Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ: LIFE) is up 7.5% at $73.11 after posting a new 52-week high of $73.50 earlier today. The laboratory equipment maker is being acquired by Thermo Fisher Inc. (NYSE: TMO) for about $15.5 billion, including debt. More coverage here.

Stay tuned for Tuesday. Fed Vice-chair Janet Yellen, Fed Governor Elizabeth Duke, and Minneapolis Fed President Narayana Kocherlakota are giving speeches. We have also noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 8:30 a.m. – Consumer price index
• 8:30 a.m. – Housing starts
• 9:15 a.m. – Industrial production
• 11:30 a.m. – 4-week Treasury bill auctions

Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) says its Focus was the number two car in the world in 2012 based on total sales. (Reuters)

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) will seek claims from NASDAQ OMX Group Inc. (NASDAQ: NDAQ) for the botched Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) initial public offering. (Reuters)

Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) will buy Microsoft Corp.’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) IPTV business. (Reuters)

Japan’s new stimulus program makes European bonds attractive. (WSJ)

News Corp.’s (NASDAQ: NWSA) Fox may pull its broadcast signal because it says Aero steals it to make money. (WSJ)

Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) cuts 150 jobs at its movie studio. (WSJ)

Lenders who finance the Portugal bailout want the country to make more cuts to get its next payment. (WSJ)

China’s consumer inflation drops to 2.1% in March. (WSJ)

Fisker Automotive may enter bankruptcy. (WSJ)

Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M) claims that J.C. Penney again violated its agreement with Martha Stewart Omnimedia Inc. (NYSE: MSO). (WSJ)

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) will launch a low-powered server to help its turnaround. (WSJ)

Google Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) plans to offer high-speed fiber in some regions may hurt cable. (WSJ)

Google’s competitors file complaints about its practices with EU regulators. (NYT)

Money management firm BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) says the Fed should cut back on QE3. (FT)

Alcoa Inc.’s (NYSE: AA) results are helped by demand for cars. (FT)

Trouble in the European Union causes German exports to drop in February. (Bloomberg)

Rumors of a buyout by Warren Buffet boost shares of Suntech Power Holdings Co. Ltd. (NYSE: STP). (Bloomberg)

Electronics Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: EA) chief executive departs as the firm missed earnings. (Reuters)

Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) ramps up hiring for its new TV entertainment unit. (Reuters)

Airbus gets an order from Indonesian airline Lion Air worth $24 billion. (Reuters)

The Employee Benefit Research Institute reports that 57% of Americans have less than $25,000 in savings when the value of their homes are backed out. (WSJ)

Corelogic reports that “underwater” homes dropped by 1.7 million in the fourth quarter, compared to the same quarter a year ago. (WSJ)

Lululemon Athletica Inc. (NASDAQ: LULU) takes some pants out of stores because they are too sheer. (WSJ)

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) pays $730 million to settle claims over paper its sold that mislead investors over a two-year period. (WSJ)

Liberty Media Corp. (NASDAQ: LMCA) may by 25% of Charter Communications Inc. (NASDAQ: CHTR). (WSJ)

HTC delays release of one of its major new phone products. (WSJ)

IDC says global PC shipments will slow again this year. (WSJ)

Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) blocks developers who do not make software that enhances the social network’s goals. (WSJ)

Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) sells debt to buy paper with higher coupons. (WSJ)

The Washington Post division of Washington Post Co. (NYSE: WPO) will charge for online content. (WSJ)

Investment firms and farmers begin to compete for land as crop prices rise. (NYT)

ABC may launch an app for people to watch TV on portable devices. (NYT)

The size of cash hoards held by U.S. companies reach record levels, according to Moody’s Investor Service. (FT)

Samsung says it will release its own smart watch to compete with Apple Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AAPL). (Bloomberg)

European February car sales fall 10%, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association. (Bloomberg)

Several banks were very close to meeting all of our financial, historic and transformative criteria, and they may be eligible for the list of safest banks in 2014, or even after the stress tests and after decisions have been formalized over returning capital to shareholders. Some of the data may seem investor oriented, but the reality is that institutional depositors, creditors and trading partners generally evaluate peers with many of the same metrics. The global economic recovery has lost some steam at the same time that the stock market has recovered. The public needs to know which of the larger banks are safe, regardless whether the economy stabilizes or worsens again.

The criteria to be among the safest banks has to be very strict by nature. It also has to apply to the larger institutions, which are either money-center banks or have multiple-state geographies. To make the list, a bank either had to have a minimum of 100 branches or it had to have retail branches in multiple states as the base level for relevance and importance. We used banks with a minimum market capitalization of $3 billion and a minimum asset base of $20 billion. These safest banks had to have the bulk of their image tied to retail and commercial banking operations with many branch offices (probably eliminate, we said above). This eliminated the great fiduciary banks such as State Street Corp. (NYSE: STT) and Bank of New York Mellon Corp. (NYSE: BK), even though they certainly would be considered among the safest banks. It also eliminated the bank holding companies with no retail banking operations, such as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS) and Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS).

24/7 Wall St. took a “Made in America” approach as well, and we screened out U.S. banking outfits that are actually subsidiaries of foreign banks. We also screened out the banks that were still in the process of making large, game-changing or transformative acquisitions, which are too difficult to evaluate in order to avoid absorbing any hidden or unknown risks.

With credit ratings becoming a risk again after a U.K. sovereign downgrade, and on the heels of the fiscal cliff and spending sequestration, all these banks also had to be considered investment grade by the major credit ratings agencies. A minimum hurdle of a 7.0% return on equity had to be seen, and we included the return on assets in this analysis as well. These safest banks had to have a minimum divided yield of 2.0% for their common stockholders, as proof that management believes that it can continue returning capital to shareholders through good and bad times, while still maintaining normal operations.

We screened out the nondiversified banks to avoid too many fluctuations throughout the business cycles. For an investment angle, we also gave preference to the banks where Wall St. analysts have a consensus price target above the current share price, indicating that some underlying value potentially remains. If a bank’s common stock was less than $10.00 per share, it had to have its metrics well above average among the largest banks.

Read Also: The Best & Worst Run Cities in America

While Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) was the best performing of the 30 Dow Jones Industrial Average stocks in 2012, it and the money-center banking giant Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) actually do not qualify to be in the safest banks in America, even though the reality is that these banks are almost certain to survive another recession. The Federal Reserve deems them to still be problem banks, and they have so far not been freed up to raise their dividends or to increase share buybacks. That may change ahead, and the reality is that these banks are believed to be strong enough to weather most negative scenarios under the impending stress tests.

Finally, we eliminated banks that we did not feel would survive another recession. Consumers have to keep their money somewhere other than under their mattresses. Having an extremely safe bank to protect your hard-earned cash, nest-eggs and safety deposit boxes in hard times is much more important than how high of a rate depositors can get on certificates of deposit and in their checking and savings accounts. As far as quality is concerned, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) has large stakes in three of the seven safest banks.

In mid-2012, banking regulators proposed to incorporate Basel III capital changes for substantially all U.S. banking organizations. Our list of safest banks shows the Tier-1 ratio today as well as the company’s projected Tier-1 ratio under the proposed rules. This also helps to eliminate any problems over safety and vulnerability ahead. If Basel III is finally adopted as proposed, the threshold for the Tier 1 common equity ratio will be 7%, consisting of a minimum level plus a capital conservation buffer.

Based on the analysis, we anticipate that future lists of the safest banks in America may include 10 or even 12 banks, rather than seven, because many banks only missed one criteria yet exceeded other hurdles handily. We still are not evaluating the community or single-region banks due to size or single geography risks. That being said, many of those community banks have better ratios than any of the larger safest banks in America.

This is the 24/7 Wall St. list of the seven safest banks in America for 2013 to deposit money into, ranked in order of safety, size by assets, and reach.  Our rank is based on financial stability, size by assets, and by reach.

The Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone is not selling well in some of Asia’s affluent cities, including Singapore and Hong Kong. (Reuters)

China may lift a 13-year ban on video game consoles. (Reuters)

Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE: BKS) will shutter many of its stores over the next 10 years. (WSJ)

Huawei smartphone sales move higher than those of Research In Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) and Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK). (WSJ)

BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) offers to buy Twitter stock at a sum that would value the company at $9 billion. (WSJ)

The RTCA wanted a tough test of 787 Dreamliners, but did not get its wish from the FAA. (WSJ)

The price of a first-class postage stamp moves to 46 cents. (WSJ)

SAC Capital Advisors begins work to keep clients as investigations into its practices continue. (NYT)

The $1.2 trillion in spending cuts set if Congress and the White House do not agree on a budget have become more likely. (FT)

Profits at China’s industrial companies rose sharply in the fourth quarter of last year. (FT)

Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) moves ahead of General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) in sales as its production recovers from the Japanese earthquake. (Bloomberg)

Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) earnings may show that its core revenue centers have not grown. (Bloomberg)

The lineup of recent, new age Web companies values them at this based on market cap — Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) at $68 billion, LinkedIn Corp. (NYSE: LNKD) at $13 billion, Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA) at $2 billion and Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) at $3.6 billion.

Sources questioned by the media say that Twitter’s revenue in 2012 was $350 million, and that the figure could reach $1 billion this year. But that forecast also has been pegged as low as $600 million.

Zynga could have sales of $1.3 billion this year, but its model is thought to be broken by most analysts. There is too much competition for online games, and Zynga’s reliance of Facebook , which has eroded, hurts it.

Groupon is also a victim of the belief that it has no real defense against competitors, although its revenue should be more than $2 billion this year.

LinkedIn is the only one of the companies, excluding Facebook, which is almost universally seen as having a business model that it can defend. The company makes money, has three divisions that bring in substantial revenue, and sales that should be higher than $1 billion this year. LinkedIn also has 200 million registered users, which means that if it can do as well mining them as it has in the past, sales and profits should each expand nicely.

Twitter has to deal with the “moat” problem, which is a staple of the education of every business school student. How easy will it be for other firms to compete with Twitter. Based on its valuation, not very easy at all. Twitter, like some small number of companies that are part of the new age Internet, can claim it has no competition. It has not turned that advantage into much revenue. Groupon and Zynga can say that they have made their models into revenue engines. But see where that has gotten them.