Investors have been forced to contend with a severe pullback in consumer demand and the panic that overtook the banking sector in late 2008.

Since March, stocks are up by nearly 50 percent and investors have shifted into riskier fixed-income assets as well, but whether these rallies continue will hinge on whether investors are drawn to those purchases, not whether they’re forced into it because nothing else looks attractive.

It used to be that Citigroup was one of the market’s most important stocks, if not the most important. At the nexus of the banking, securities and lending industries that benefited most from the easy-credit boom of the middle of the decade, its success as a stock mirrored the market and the economy.Somewhere around 2006, when people started to call for a breakup of the company, it was supplanted by a company even more tied to the derivative-fueled mess that masked the holes in the economic landscape – Goldman Sachs.

But Goldman continued to earn massive profits while Citigroup nearly died a painful death. Shares eventually fell to less than $1 a share, it was kicked out of the Dow and investors started to view other consumer banks as better indicators of the market’s health.

Sure, things look rosy for Goldman Sachs (GS.N), but the firm hardly represents the broad U.S. economic situation, as investors are looking over a mélange of lousy data, with dribs and drabs of mildly encouraging information in the mix. Goldman Sachs headquarters building in New York. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

Tuesday’s retail sales figures weren’t all that great – the strength comes from auto sales and rising gasoline prices (and rising gas prices aren’t exactly great for consumers) – and Wednesday’s data on capacity utilization and energy inventories are likely to confirm the ongoing slack in the economy.