Even if Greece and the Institute of International Finance reach a deal this weekend over their government-issued debt, they aren’t out of the woods yet. Ben May, a European economist at Capital Economics in London, says, “The real issue will be how many of Greece’s creditors will participate in that deal.” It could be a long weekend in Athens. And the Daily Pulse is up a beat or two on news that more home buyers are signing on the dotted line than were a year ago. The National Association of Realtors reported today that existing home sales in December increased 5 percent over November’s total.

It’s seeming like the employment picture is finally improving in the U.S. After going the wrong way a week ago, the number of people signing up for unemployment benefits fell to its lowest level in more than 3 1/2 years. Fred Dickson from D.A. Davidson says banks are lending again allowing small businesses to get lines of credit and hire staff.

It’s seeming like the employment picture is finally improving in the U.S. After going the wrong way a week ago, the number of people signing up for unemployment benefits fell to its lowest level in more than 3 1/2 years. Fred Dickson from D.A. Davidson says banks are lending again allowing small businesses to get lines of credit and hire staff. And the Daily Pulse is down today on the revelation that if you look at the chasm between the rich and the rest from a different vantage point, it grows exponentially. Literally.

Stocks got another push from a surprisingly strong report on the housing market today. The National Association of Home Builders index rose four points to 25, its highest level since June 2007. Any reading below 50 is still a negative outlook, but today’s report marked four months of a consecutive increases. Some are asking if we’ve seen the bottom of the housing market.

A credit-reporting agency crunched the numbers and found that Americans cut their credit card balances by 11 percent in 2011 to an average of $6,576. Lynn Franco, the director of the Consumer Research Center at the Conference Board, points out an annual average doesn’t tell the whole story. And the Daily Pulse is up today on news that many Americans may finally be ready for a new car in 2012. According to a recent study, the average age of our cars hit an all-time high of 10.8 years in 2011, and that could mean Americans are ready for a new ride sooner rather than later.

The U.S. markets are closed in observance of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, so we’ve got a lesson on why it’s important to look both ways before crossing Wall Street. Look right and you’ll see the European debt crisis, turn left and it’s China’s overheated economy. Economist Kash Mansori tells us why we should care about China. Plus, a new Pew study says two-thirds of Americans see a profound conflict between the rich and poor.

Just when things were starting to look up in Europe, Standard & Poors announced credit ratings downgrades for several European countries, including France and Austria (from AAA to AA+). Even more troubling was news that Greek officials ended negotiations on a debt swap with private creditors without reaching an agreement. Mark Blyth from Brown University says Greece has four ways out of its crisis: devalue, deflate, inflate or default. The Daily Pulse is down today on news that JP Morgan Chase announced a 23-percent drop in fourth-quarter profits compared to the same period in 2010. But don’t fret, they still made record profits in 2011.

After all the talk of booming holiday retail sales, the actual numbers were up by just a tenth of a point, much lower than expected. Maybe everyone really did give cars for Christmas as the holiday ads suggest, because autos and gas were the main drivers of December retail sales. We spoke to Brian Gendreau, a market strategist at Cetera Financial Group, and he told us it seems odd, “that people would buy less in the way of electronics during the Christmas season than they would in November, Black Friday sales or no Black Friday sales.” Gendreau says many forecasters, even the really bullish ones, are expecting “fairly slow growth.” And the Daily Pulse is down today on concerns about spiraling student loan debts. Today Mark Greene, the CEO of the credit score agency FICO, told Yahoo Finance that two-thirds of bank risk professionals recently surveyed think delinquencies on student loans will rise in 2012. That debt is nearing the trillion-dollar mark. Gulp.

The markets fell before the open and struggled most of the day on word the mighty German economy contracted in the last three months of 2011. Doug Cote, the chief market strategist at ING Investment Management, offered some reassurance. While you can’t ignore Europe, Cote says today’s headlines were merely background noise. His attention is on China, where signs are pointing to the end of a housing bubble. And the Daily Pulse is down today on the “unhealthy correlation” between building skyscrapers and financial disasters. Seems they go hand in hand.