Housing and Construction Stats Improve; Mobius: Emerging Markets Close to Bull Market; Sprint Beats Expectations; Bovespa Hits Seven-Month High;  Buffett Says Wall Street Sold “Sewage”; Liberty Spins Off DirecTV; Airlines Low on Cash; Mexico Lifts Work Ban on Flu Scare

While many analysts expect U.S. corporate earnings and overall economic data to remain weak by historical standards, there may well be enough of an improvement over the prior months and quarters to spark some optimism that there are better times ahead.

Tuesday, the Dow fell 38 points. But the real action is in the gold market – the price rose to $908 per ounce. Even the gold miners are finally going up. What does it mean? Is inflation closer than we thought?

It came as no surprise to me that both gold got sold off a bit the moment that the gold market opened in the Far East on Monday morning. But it didn’t amount to much, because shortly after 2 p.m. in Hong Kong…1:00 a.m. Monday morning N.Y. time…gold began a slow rise that continued right through the London open. This lasted until the silver fix in London (noon) before selling off about ten bucks. But as soon as floor trading opened on the Comex in New York, the price rose…then spiked to its high of the day…before it was gently capped and then got slowly sold off until the end of Globex trading at 5:15 p.m. Eastern time.

Siemens Settle Bribery Charges for $1.3 Billion; Google Walks From Yahoo; Enbridge Channels 88% Profit Growth; FCC Approves Sprint-Clearwire Merger; GMAC Finance Revenue Stuck in Reverse; Time Warner Revenue Unchanged; Molson Coors Pops; News Corp. Profit Down 30%

Verizon Wireless has agreed to buy Alltel Corp. (PINK: ALTEO) for $28.1 billion in a deal that should vault Verizon past AT&T Inc. (T) as the country’s No. 1 mobile phone company.