Fourth quarter GDP ended on a uptrend, coming in at 3.1%. The state of the economy was healthy and it looked like growth would continue to match or exceed Q4. Based on that scenario, Bank of America (BAC) analyst Ethan Harris, forecast first-quarter 2011 GDP to come in at 3.3%.

But in the few short months of 2011, the world is getting turned upside down. The conflict in Libya has cut OPEC oil production and sent oil prices skyrocketing. In turn, the price of gasoline is nearing $4.00 per gallon. And food processors are raising prices due to higher raw commodity prices. These two factors have put a dent in the household budget.

Bank of America (BAC) is a pretty big player in its industry; it's got brand equity -- everyone has heard of it. How is its stock looking these days?

At the time of writing, shares could be had for $13.44. The 52-week low for the company is $10.91; the 52-week high is $19.86. That's a tight range, and as one might imagine, this company has been a vehicle for traders trying to ride whatever volatility is available at any given time.

Let's go back to the financial crisis and the practices that brought this country to its knees. Banks developed a fancy scheme whereby they absolved themselves of all risk from the loans they made. They simply wrapped them up in a bundle and sold them to someone else. What they were doing is essentially packaging and reselling "junk."

When the news of how bad things were became known, the markets froze and collapsed. No one knew who had which securities, and if they did, they didn't know their true value.

Analyst Upgrades

• Red Hat (RHT) to outperform from neutral at RW Baird.
• Cogdell Spencer (CSA) to buy from hold at Citigroup.
• Micron (MU) to neutral from reduce at Nomura.
• El Paso Electric (EE) to buy from hold at Jefferies.
• MICROS Systems (MCRS) and Harmony Gold (HMY) to outperform from sector perform at RBC Capital.
• Meridian Bioscience (VIVO) to buy from hold at Canaccord.
• Verso Paper (VRS) to outperform from neutral at Credit Suisse.
• Sony (SNE) to buy from hold at Deutsche Bank.
• Noble Corp. (NE) and Baker Hughes (BHI) to buy from neutral at UBS.
• Tyson Foods (TSN) and Smithfield Foods (SFD) to buy from hold at BB&T.

The markets were taking a breather after a huge recovery, but today's rally was the return of the global growth and rebuilding trade. An absolutely dismal home sales number did not even keep the bulls from charging today.

Here were the unofficial closing bells:

Dow Jones 12,086.02 +67.39 (0.56%)
S&P 500 1,297.54 +3.77 (0.29%)
Nasdaq 2,698.30 +14.43 (0.54%)

Monday could have been far worse. Japan led things south with news that the nuclear reactors were not shut down and could pose serious risks ahead. This sent Japan's NIKKEI 225 down more than 6% and back under the dreaded 10,000 mark. US markets held up better than expected, while news that Saudi troops were being asked to enter into protect Bahrain's infrastructure sent oil back up. US markets came back from larger losses late in the session.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow Jones 11,993.16 -51.24 (-0.43%)
S&P 500 1,296.39 -7.89 (-0.60%)
Nasdaq 2,700.97 -14.64 (-0.54%)

Top analyst upgrades and downgrades
Top Japanese fund, ETF, and ADR movers

Banks are back in the news -- in a good way. Speculation is that mergers and acquisitions will be picking up, so are profits. Some are looking to raise their dividend and/or buy back more shares. Bank of America (BAC) is one of them.

The CEO, Brian Moynihan, announced that B of A wasn't looking to buy other banks. Instead, the bank would be focused on returning more capital to shareholders in the form of a regular dividend (now 4 cents a year), share buybacks and special cash dividends. The reason: he feels the bank will earn between $35 billion and $40 billion a year (yes, billion ... a year) in pretax earnings when the business normalizes. (But there's the catch: when does business get to normal?)

This is the fourth update to my ranting eight months ago that acquiring six of the most hated, and most highly traded stocks with constant negative headlines would outperform the overall market. The theory has born fruit as the toxic stocks are ahead and the difference is increasing over time.

"Even when the market is up a lot, you can always find some good stocks that have been left behind but could be on the verge of a rebound," says George Putnam.

The editor of The Turnaround Letter explains, "That's where we suggest you focus your efforts right now. These eight stocks all have strong business franchises and have all significantly lagged the market over the last two years.

"In fact, several of them are still trading near or even below where they were in early 2009. Here, we look at Bank of America (BAC), Best Buy (BBY), Campbell Soup (CPB), Cisco Systems (CSCO), Microsoft (MSFT) and Sprint Nextel (S).

When it comes to hard-disk drives, Western Digital (WDC) is the largest publicly traded operator in the U.S. And with its recent deal, it will get much larger. That is, the company has agreed to pay $4.3 billion for the data storage business of Hitachi.

Based on the stock move for Western Digital, investors love the transaction. In early Monday trading, the shares were up a sizzling 17.33% to $35.21.