By Desmond Lachman

When the history of the euro crisis is written, markets will not come out well. For after having completely failed to anticipate the crisis in the first instance, markets now seem to be overly complaisant at a time that the clearest of political ill-winds of change are blowing through the Old Continent. And by being overly complaisant, markets are failing to fulfill their role of imposing discipline and pressure for economic and political reform on wayward European politicians.

By now it is increasingly recognized that the recipe of severe budget austerity and structural reform that has been imposed by Europe’s core countries on Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain is not working. Indeed, there is a growing recognition that the application of severe budget austerity within a euro straitjacket is driving the European periphery’s economy into a downward economic spiral. Even the IMF now owns up to the fact that the adverse impact of budget belt tightening on economic

The second homebuilder to go public this year was trading higher Wednesday, with Taylor Morrison's (TMHC) shares rising 5% on the NYSE after pricing at $22 the previous evening.

If all goes according to plan, it won't be the last. William Lyon Homes filed to go public  -- and raise up to $200 million -- on Tuesday. TRI Pointe Homes (TPH), the first homebuilder to go public since the pre-housing bust year of 2004, started trading in January.

The return of the builders to Wall Street, along with the general rise of these stocks over the past year, comes as data increasingly point to a housing market rebound, albeit one with plenty of caution thrown in. (Click here for our senior columnist Michael Santoli's take on homebuilder stocks as "a poor risk-reward bargain for long-term holders.")

Meanwhile, with a rash of recent pricings and some highly anticipated upcoming debuts, such as SeaWorld (which could make one of the largest IPO splashes of 2013), it's time to update our IPO scorecard.