General Motors (GM) closed up 2% Wednesday, a day after a series of positive reports from banks involved in the company's initial public offering. GM will have a presence at the North American Auto Show beginning on Jan. 10. Overall implied volatility of 31 is at the low end of its one-month range, according to Track Data, suggesting low price movement.

CBOE Volatility Index-VIX closed down 42 cents to 17.06, below its 100-day moving average 21.12.

Analyst Downgrades

• Diodes (DIOD) to hold from buy at Benchmark.

Analyst Initiations

• General Motors (GM) with a buy at BofA/Merrill and Citigroup, with an overweight at Barclays and Morgan Stanley, and with an outperform at Credit Suisse and RBC Capital.
• LPL Investment (LPLA) with an overweight at Morgan Stanley, a buy at Goldman, a neutral at JPMorgan, and a market perform at Keefe Bruyette.
• Booz Allen (BAH) with a market perform at Wells Fargo.
• ValueVision (VVTV) with an overweight at Piper Jaffray.

Some positive signs are blowin' in the wind. Maybe they're enough to underpin a real recovery. Maybe not. But they are definitely positive, and together, may be the foundation of a stock rally with some strength. Here are some of them.

Dividends: General Electric (GE), Weyerhaeuser (WY) and many other companies are raising theirs. GE's quarterly dividend went from 10 cents a share early this year to 12 cents to 14 cents. If you own it by December 27, you'll get it on January 25. GE is almost a surrogate for the economy as a whole since it has so many divisions, offering many products and services. When GE raises its dividend it means the board and management see better times ahead. Companies hate to raise or initiate dividends only to rescind them a few months or even a year later. They know some investors buy the stock for income, and if that shrinks, those investors sell, push the price down and move to another stock. Watch for more companies to raise their payouts (especially banks). It's a sure sign they see better earnings ahead.

Nobody knows what the future holds. But there are a few things shaping up that suggest certain things will most likely happen. Here are some of the major ones.

Interest Rates: Low at the beginning of the year, then headed higher for a long time. If you have an adjustable rate mortgage and you're still paying it, it's the perfect time to get it refinanced, if you can qualify. Interest rates are definitely going up; it's just a matter of when. As long as the Fed is pumping money in (QE2 is targeted with $800 billion .... with the possibility of more behind it), rates will stay low, unless investors think inflation will get way out of hand. Then rates will go higher no matter what the Fed does as investors sell longer term bonds to beat the coming inflation. Initially, rising interest rates will be bullish as they are a precursor to a healthy economy. But that bull will morph and become a bear when rates start jumping as the Fed tries to get ahead of inflation. Tricky business. Investors will do well to have floating rate assets and fixed rate liabilities.

General Motors (GM) closed up 12 cents to $33.86 on active December 34 and January 35 calls with total call option volume of 27K contracts compared to 10K puts. December call option implied volatility is at 22, January is at 27, March is at 30, versus its ten-day average of 33, according to Track Data.

Honeywell (HON) announced the increase in its annual dividend by 10% to $1.33 into its 2011 outlook announcement scheduled for 9:00 AM on December 15. Overall option implied volatility of 25 is below its 26-week average of 29, according to Track Data, suggesting decreasing price movement.

Options Update is by Stock Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com.

Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Chrysler, said that Chrysler plans to introduce a Fiat in the U.S. powered by natural gas. Bloomberg/Businessweek quotes Marchionne: "Natural gas engines offer a better way to cut emissions because they are cheaper than competing technologies."

Fiat is the leader in Europe in natural gas engines with 80% share of methane powered cars and 55% of light commercial vehicles. Alfredo Altavilla, quoted in Bloomberg/Businessweek said natural gas is a "more affordable solution" as it is less expensive to produce transport and distribute compared with other fuel sources.

If you are looking for clues telling you which stocks have a good chance of increasing in value, you might want consider watching what insiders are doing. After all, talk is cheap, but when insiders put their own money on the line, you should sit up and take note.

Citigroup (C) topped the insider-buying charts for the week ending July 9th as insiders snapped up 542,198 shares of company stock at a market value of $2,330,386. During the past six months, insiders have increased their overall holdings in the company by 26.58% and now own 0.08% of C stock.

General Motors (GM) was not far behind, with insiders buying 43,150 shares at a market value of $1,455,536.

If you missed General Motors' (GM) initial public offering, don't fret. Feelings of being "on the outside" regarding GM's big, second debutante ball, of sorts, are both normal and rational.

They're especially justified when you consider that it was you -- the U.S. taxpayer -- who helped GM continue to exist. Without the U.S. government's prudent intervention, GM probably would not be open for business today

Even so, let the IPO process play itself outside. Institutional investors came in, got their typical, large initial pieces of the IPO pie from the bookrunner, and will likely flip their shares fairly early for a $1 or $3 premium -- if they haven't already -- and make a quick killing.

What a difference a year makes. General Motors made a dramatic turnaround from a $1.2 billion loss a year ago to a profit of $2 billion in the third quarter, The Wall Street Journal reported. Revenue grew by 21% to $34 billion in the quarter. Last year, GM lost 73 cents per share.

This encouraging profit report comes just in time for GM's stock offering, which is due in the next few weeks. CEO Daniel Akerson said in a conference call, in WSJ's words, that "GM is still losing money in Europe and must improve the way its vehicles are marketed in its core North American market."