• These S&P 500 stocks have had the biggest increases in ‘buy’ ratings so far this year
• Here’s how the FAANG companies stack up this earnings season
• More companies than usual are beating earnings estimates — and sales numbers are just as bullish for the stock market

Tracking the Reddit buzz

Conversations among traders on Reddit’s WallStreetBets message board fueled the recent short-squeezes in shares of GameStop GME, +10.30%, Bed Bath & Beyond BBBY, -1.15%, American Entertainment AMC, -3.74% and other companies.

What if an analysis of traders’ online chatter can give other traders — or even investors — a leg up on the market? Mark DeCabre interviewed Boris Spiwak, director of marketing at Thinknum, which offers a brand new service to harvest and analyze the new data.

More on the Reddit and WallStreetBets fallout:

• Short-sellers were pulling back even before Reddit’s GameStop squeeze
• Why WallStreetBets chatter over GameStop is likely to seen as free speech

Ready for the Super Bowl?

If you’re only watching for the commercials, MarketWatch has you covered here.

Also: Bucs, not Chiefs, will win one for the bulls if the Super Bowl Indicator is right

Bitcoin or gold?

Bitcoin BTCUSD, +0.04% is up 30% this year, and it is mainly being pushed up by young men, which may signal “investor overconfidence” in the cryptocurrency, according to research cited by Lisa Kramer, a professor of finance at the University of Toronto.

Investors may have another opportunity now in gold GC00, +1.22%, following its price decline, according to Mark Hulbert.

Gold or bitcoin? An investor who owns both weighs in.

More on crypto:

• Coinbase will go public the same way Palantir, Slack and others did
• Dogecoin rockets after Elon Musk and Mark Cuban tweet about it
• Coinbase will go public the same way Palantir, Slack and others did

A new era for Amazon

Online retailing giant Amazon AMZN, +0.83% is about to get its second-ever CEO. Here’s what to know about Andy Jassy, who will succeed Jeff Bezos.

Bezos has been great for investors, as this chart of the stock price vs. the S&P 500 SPX, +0.46% shows. Critics say Bezos is showing great timing by leaving just as politicians and lawyers threaten to take away the fun.

More on Amazon:

• 3 ways Jeff Bezos’ tenure at Amazon helped and hurt American workers and consumers
• What new Amazon CEO Andy Jassy needs to do to become a leader in sustainability like Apple
• Amazon’s delivery speed is facing increasing competition from rivals with a fleet of stores
• Amazon’s electric delivery vehicles hit the road in L.A.

An online will might save you money — but watch the details

CD Moriarty suggests asking yourself these three questions before creating an online will or going to an estate-planning lawyer.

Losing a spouse is bad enough — this is what will happen to your taxes

Mike Piper shares advice for couples to adjust their retirement accounts so the survivor won’t face a higher tax rate.

Read on: 37 states don’t tax your Social Security benefits — make that 38 in 2022

Curtains for Robinhood?

The elimination of commissions by brokerage firms has helped bring many more individual investors into the stock market. But the brokers still need to make money. For Robinhood, whose clients temporarily drove up prices of several heavily-shorted stocks, the critical business line for revenue is called payment for order flow.

Chris Matthews explains what payment for order flow is and why it could be curtailed by regulators or even banned.

Related: Driving stock prices to the moon can hurt America

How to hide from prying eyes online

Jurica Dujmovic explains the dangers of maintaining an online presence and how to maintain a secret digital identity.

How hard should BlackRock push on ESG?

BlackRock Inc. BLK, -0.48% is the world’s largest money manger and CEO Larry Fink has asked the companies it invests in to share their plans for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. The firm may vote against management teams at companies that don’t comply or even divest their shares in those companies. This sits well with some ESG advocates, but others think BlackRock is moving too slowly.

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