The market is duller than a Colts victory parade at the moment.

We're dealing with a fairly standard issue "calm before the storm" that we often see on a data-limited Monday when the rest of the week contains the more significant events.  The supportive trends we began to note in the last post have continued to foster a narrow range of prices with almost perfectly flat directional movement.  In other words, the simple existence of a "narrow range" doesn't always mean prices aren't moving.  We can see narrow ranges while still moving DIRECTIONALLY.  For instance, even on a 16 tick rally, if the subsequent highs and lows are only a tick or two higher than their previous marks, the line on the chart would be fairly smooth yet still be very much higher at the end of the day.

TOKYO/DETROIT (Reuters) – Toyota Motor Corp said on Tuesday it would recall its flagship Prius hybrid in Japan for braking problems and that it had halted shipments of two other hybrid models to check for similar problems.

The world's largest automaker is already under fire for two other recalls covering more than 8 million vehicles worldwide due to problems with slipping floormats and sticky accelerator pedals.

Toyota is fighting to keep its reputation for quality and reliability while dealing with a potential rush of litigation for crashes linked to 19 deaths and numerous injuries in the United States over the past decade.

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Atmel Corp.'s loss widened in the fourth quarter as the chip designer wrote down the value of its business, but its sales rose and investors pushed up its stock price after hours Monday.

The company said after the market closed Monday that it lost $77.0 million, or 17 cents per share, in the last three months of 2009. That compares with a loss of $24.4 million, or 5 cents per share, a year earlier.

Excluding one-time items, the company earned 4 cents per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had estimated on average that it would break even in the quarter.

TOKYO (Reuters) – Asian share markets struggled to hold firmer ground on Tuesday but won some respite from recent losses, while the euro rose tentatively as investors took a break from selling it off over fiscal concerns in the euro zone.

The MSCI index of Asian shares outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS) slipped 0.2 percent after dipping to a five-month low, although IT stocks gained, and shares in Shanghai and Seoul turned higher while S&P futures were flat.

Analysts said confidence was still flimsy, however, with worries about fiscal problems in Greece, Spain and Portugal likely to limit the scope of a rebound, and financial shares trailed other sectors after banks led financials lower on Wall Street.

WASHINGTON – Could this turn into something more than political theater? President Barack Obama's televised dialogue with Republican lawmakers on health care, promised for later this month, has the makings of an entertaining exchange. But the differences between the basic Democratic and GOP ideas are stark — and the two sides have increasingly hardened their positions in this election year.

Yet, in a story with more twists than a soap opera, Obama's invitation to congressional leaders of both parties to attend a Feb. 25 meeting can't be dismissed as a mere diversion. Although many Americans have doubts about the Democrats' sweeping plans to cover the uninsured, Republicans can't afford to be perceived as oblivious to the health care insecurities of middle-class families.

This was the half time scene in Miami last night at Super Bowl XLIV...

I am sure many watchers were thinking:  Why The Who? 

Maybe some of us in our 60s and 70s need to be “put out to pasture” or start “whittling wood” on the front porch.  However, as a boomer, I was inspired to see these guys still rocking and rolling.  I enjoyed the music and hope they keep playing.  Peter Townsend will go down as one of most brilliant musical writers of all time. 

That’s enough about The Who and dating myself.  Lets’ talk about secondary market and locking loans.

One of the areas we review during our FOCIS-plus Studies is whether a company has a centralized lock process.  Centralizing the lock function means all lock requests and confirmations are managed by a “gate keeper” in the secondary market department. 

PHILADELPHIA – Life insurer Lincoln National Corp. on Monday posted net income of $102 million for its fiscal fourth quarter, compared with a loss of $506 million a year earlier, but it lost $485 million for the year.

Lincoln was one of two insurance companies that accepted money from the government's $700 billion financial bailout; it received $950 million.

Lincoln's net income for the period that ended Dec. 31 amounted to 27 cents per share. The loss a year earlier amounted to $1.98 per share.

Its revenue rose to $2.4 billion from $2.15 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008.

The results include two non-cash charges, one of $109 million, after taxes, to reflect the drop in value of the company's media assets, the other of $98 million to reflect a loss in its variable annuity hedge program.

LONDON (AFP) – European stocks staged a fragile rebound on Monday after sharp falls last week caused by mounting debt fears in Europe, but Tokyo hit the lowest point in nearly two months as most Asian indices fell.

Approaching midday in London, the benchmark FTSE 100 index was up 0.11 percent to 5,066.37 points as it failed to hold on to a robust gain of almost one percent in early morning trade.

Last week the FTSE slumped by almost 2.5 percent on growing concerns that debt-ridden countries Greece, Spain and Portugal may be unable to stabilise their public finances, having spent heavily to combat recession.

GREENWICH, Conn. – Regional freight railroad operator Genesee & Wyoming Inc. said Monday its fourth-quarter earnings fell 28 percent as a weak economy knocked down demand for the goods it hauls.

But the company said demand appears to have stabilized in the last three months of the year.

The railroad earned $18.3 million, or 44 cents per share, compared with $25.3 million, or 70 cents per share, in the fourth quarter of 2008. The 2009 quarter includes a tax benefit of about 3 cents per share.

Revenue fell 6 percent to $139.9 million.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected a profit of 37 cents per share on revenue of $132.7 million.

NEW YORK – A judge promised Monday to decide by the end of next week whether to approve a $150 million settlement between the Securities and Exchange Commission and Bank of America over civil charges alleging the bank misled shareholders when it acquired Merrill Lynch.

U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff said he will decide only after giving lawyers on both sides a written list of questions he has and hearing their responses.