Headlines continue to dominate the trading landscape, perpetuating a news-driven trader’s market rather than allowing a healthier valuation-driven investor’s market to return to favor. After all, that’s what stock market investing is supposed to be about. Narrow market breadth and daily stock price gyrations have been driven primarily by three headline generators -- oil price, the Fed’s monetary policy, and China growth. Sure, there were many other important news items, notably the sinister course of Islamic terrorism.

The S&P 500 large caps closed 2015 essentially flat on a total return basis, while the NASDAQ 100 showed a little better performance at +8.3% and the Russell 2000 small caps fell -5.9%. Overall, stocks disappointed even in the face of modest expectations, especially the small caps as market leadership was mostly limited to a handful of large and mega-cap darlings. Notably, the full year chart for the S&P 500 looks very much like 2011.

Earnings season is in full swing, and on balance, investors are liking what they hear. Tech leaders Google (GOOG) and IBM (IBM) got bought in truckloads after their fine earnings reports, although Apple (AAPL) disappointed after the close on Wednesday.

Another earnings season is underway. I haven’t noticed much in the way of earnings pre-announcements (i.e., warnings), which is a positive sign.

U.S. stocks are raring to rally. Earnings reports have been quite good. Consumers are spending despite stubbornly high unemployment. Interest rates are at rock bottom, which is good for borrowing and also makes stock yields relatively attractive. So what’s the problem? Oh, just the usual—fear of a European debt meltdown triggering a global recession.