After an awful previous week, stocks are rebounding Monday thanks to March retail sales jumping and a better than expected earnings report from Citigroup.

Retail sales in March rose 1.1 percent, the largest gain since September 2012, showing that the cold weather that curbed spending is over and the U.S. economy is recovering. Sales were forcasted to only rise 0.8 percent.

"The retail sales are a great barometer for the weather-related slowdown, and expectations across the board were beat," said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at Wunderlich Securities.

And thanks to Citigroup's earnings that beat estimates, the financial sector is seeing its shares rise. Citigroup beat expected earnings of $1.14 per share and announced $3.9 billion in first-quarter earnings, or $1.23 a share.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was recently up over 150 points (.96 percent), near session highs. Visa is leading the way in the Dow, up over $5 after being upgraded by Robert W. Baird.

The S&P 500 and the NASDAQ are also up Monday, up 17 points and 38 points respectively at mid-day.

Last week, the the CBOE Volatility Index, or the VIX, which is a measure of investor uncertainity, rose 22 percent last week. Monday, it fell 3.3 percent.

The lack of an extreme spike in the VIX tells me there is not much panic out there. We are still in a very solid, fundamentally sound market," said Frederick at Charles Schwab.

Besides Citigroup, this is a big week of earnings reports for companies. Tuesday will see earnings reports from Coca-Cola, Intel and Yahoo. Wednesday, those of Bank of America, Google and Capitol One will be revealed. Thursday, General Electric, Morgan Stanley, Pepsico and Chipotle will share reports.

With all of these companies set to report this week, investors will get a good look at the health and performance of some of their favorite stocks. If good numbers continue, Friday's sharp fall won't be repeated anytime soon.

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