6 gut checks before the stock market’s opening bell

By Shawn Langlois

Good morning.
The stock market will get another chance to go all Wonder Woman on whatever economic indicators are fired off this morning, just like it’s pretty much been able to do all week. And all earnings season. A dip in housing starts? Ping! Rising jobless claims? Clack! Weakness on the manufacturing front? Tzing! A complete halt to the Fed’s cash infusion flood? Well, she might need to warm up the invisible jet when that time comes.
But for now, it’s good to be long. And soul-crushing to be short. Unless, of course, your short call was on Facebook after it debuted a year ago. Then you’re fine. With just a few exceptions, it’s been a tough slog for those betting against this thing. According to Miller Tabak & Co., the Goldman rolling shorts index is up 32% since June when the market touched its recent low. The S&P is up 29% over that period.
Therein lies some warning signs, however. “It’s giving the illusion to a degree that the rally is extremely healthy,” Miller Tabak’s top economist told WSJ MoneyBeat. “The buying isn’t as broad or as meaningful as you might expect.”
Key market gauges: Unlucky seven for gold looks to be in the offing, with the June contract GCM3 -2.06%  delivery down almost 1%. If it closes lower, that will be seven straight sessions. The loss for the week is approaching 5% as the dollar gains on word of the Fed potentially winding down its asset-buying program. You might want to sell your Italian horns ASAP with Credit Suisse’s Ric Deverell predicting “gold is going to get crushed” and will break below $1,000 an ounce in five years.
The Nikkei JP:NIK 0.67%  closed up almost 1% to claw back from yesterday’s dip, while Hong Kong and Seoul were closed for holidays, keeping a lid on volume across the region. Europe XX:SXXP 0.24%  is turning higher and looks like a safe bet to close with a weekly gain. As for U.S. markets, futures on the Dow YMM3 0.07%  and the S&P ESM3 0.11%  are showing some upside before the opening bell.
The economy: It’s been a somewhat dreary week for economic data — not that the market cares anymore — but we could end on a high note with consumer sentiment expected to have risen in May. Economists are looking for a reading of 77.5, up from 76.4, as the markets have risen and jobs have been more plentiful.  Later, the Conference Board’s leading indicators for April may show a gain of 0.3% after a dip of 0.1% in March. Read: Spotlight on the economy.
As for the market not caring, this chart tells the story:

Bloomberg

The buzz: Check yo self, Slim! The Nerd from the Northwest has taken back his throne as the richest man in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Bill Gates returned to the throne he hasn’t held since 2007 after shares of Microsoft MSFT -0.20%  hit a five-year high yesterday. His fortune is up 16% so far this year at $72.7 billion. A devastated Carlos Slim is toiling at $72.1 billion. More from The Tell.
Facebook FB -0.15%  turns a year old tomorrow, in terms of its life as a public company. What a lame year it’s been for the stock, especially considering what the market’s done. Get ready to be Facebook’d to death this morning and through the weekend with a multimedia deluge of charts, slides, videos, etc. MarketWatch/WSJ will be as guilty as anybody. Check out this. And that. Or how about this.
GM GM 0.36%  and Ford F 0.20%  are trending after European car sales results showed the first monthly rise in a year and a half. Tesla TSLA -0.27%  is grabbing renewed attention after the company priced a chunk of its shares pretty much at market rates, a sign that demand is running high regardless of the recent pop.
The chart of the day: Drexel University finance professor Wesley Gray posted this chart showing how NFL execs overpay for their investments, drawing comparisons with the stock market. Chasing the college superstars (one lousy, purple-drank-quaffing excuse for a Raider springs to mind) is generally a losing proposition. “Similar to stock investing, on average, buying high-flying growth stocks is a terrible bet,” Gray wrote. Sometimes it’s just too alluring to go for the sexy name, even if trading down for value is the obvious choice. As always, there are the exceptions. “Owners of Microsoft in the early 80′s won the equivalent of the NFL championship. Try telling them that growth investing is a waste of time,” he added.

Cade Massey/Richard Thaler

The call of the day: Get over your loathing for the airline industry and take a hard look at Southwest Airlines LUV 0.00% , says SumZero contributor Kyle Cerminara. He is looking for the stock to more than double to $32 within a year’s time. “Management had tripled capacity per share since the peak of the last cycle while at the same time the share price had fallen by 50%,” he wrote. In other words, the market is giving you the opportunity to own six times as much capacity for each dollar of investment. Falling oil prices could also provide a tailwind, but even if that didn’t materialize “we would be left ‘only’ owning an under-valued, well-managed industry leader,” he wrote.
Random reads: Let’s commemorate the retirement of Posh’s husband with one of the greatest interviews of all time. (Ear muffs for my millions of grade school readers).
Google+, a beautiful disappointment.
In tough economic times like these, Spaniards simply have to learn to make sacrifices. Like the elephant-hunting king, who is giving up his yacht.
And if it all gets to be too much, there’s always the crack pipe.
Kai from Dogtown? Up for murder? What happened to all that heartwarming “you’re worthwhile and nobody can ever take that away from you” stuff?
I was on the fence about seeing “The Great Gatsby,” until this story informed me that it’s in godforsaken 3-D. Please. Stop.