Let's call it a scam and let's just admit we are all betting said scam because we need the stock market to rebound. There is no doubt the stock market plays a critical role in confidence among consumers and businesses. The stock market is seen as a proxy for the economy and the health of corporate America even though it's a better proxy of what's going to happen. On that note, we need the market to find traction and continue to rebound. As it turns out, that European stress test was a scam, at least that's the assessment over at JP Morgan (JPM). Forget other dubious parameters, the fix was in by only testing trading books, not accruals, and making Tier 1 capital ratios hurdles too easy to clear.

1.7% bias by not looking into accrual books
1.2% bias by not looking at core Tier 1 ratios
2.9% bias when applied would have seen 54 banks, not only 7, fail a more reasonable stress test.
Happy Days are here Again

New home sales picked up in June to an annualized pace of 333,000 from 300,000 in May. The former figure was the second worst month on record.

I think sales in the West were the lowest ever. Moreover, prices have dipped again. Unlike existing homes where prices are spiking, new home prices have dropped from a $284,100 average in February to $242,900 in June. If you took advantage of that first-time homebuyer's credit to buy a new home in February you could be down more than $30,000 after the tax break. Still, we will take the news as good because it could have been worse.