(By Harry Boxer) The stock market indices had a strong morning and a very weak afternoon and ended up negative on the day.
The day started out with a little move down, and then they quickly snapped back to new 2-day highs. They then rolled over, bounced, and then came down hard after the lunch hour when the Nasdaq 100 dropped from 2557 to 2520, a 37-point drop. The S&P 500 dropped from 1327 to 1310, a 17-point drop. In the last 10 minutes they bounced to avoid even steeper losses.
Net of the day, the Dow was down 77.42 at 12,496.38, closing under 12,500, about 100 points off its high, the S&P 500 was down 9.30 at 1314.88, 13 points off its high, and the Nasdaq 100 down 18.76 at 2527.44, 30 points off the high.
Advance-declines were worse than 2 to 1 negative on New York, and nearly 2 1/2 to 1 negative on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 2 1/2 to 1 negative on New York, total volume 684 million shares traded. Nasdaq traded a little over 1.5 billion, and had a worse than 2 to 1 negative volume ratio.
It was a decidedly negative day on Wall Street today. News about the Greek elections and downgrade of Spanish credit didn't help.
TheTechTrader.com board, as a result, was mostly negative. Large caps stocks such as Google Inc. (GOOG), was down 4.01 to 561.09, and Apple Inc. (AAPL) down 4.00 even to 572.16. They weren't too bad, but they were negative on the session.
In addition, Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) lost 1.69 to 214.72, and Goldman Sachs (GS) was down 1.32 to 92.72.
The only other point-plus losers was Cobalt International Energy, Inc. (CIE), down 1.36 to 21.67, except the Direxion Daily Financial Bull 3X Shares (FAS), down 1.23 to 77.89, and The Direxion Daily Small Cap Bull 3X Shares (TNA) down 1.56 to 45.53.
On the plus side there were several very good trading issues today. Mitek Systems Inc. (MITK) had a wonderful day, although it gave back a chunk of its gains, jumping as high as 3.12 at one point, closing up 33 cents to 2.73, or 13%, on 1.3 million shares. Dendreon Corp (DNDN) was up 86 cents to 7.11, or 14%, on 25.4 million shares. E-Commerce China Dangdang Inc. (DANG) gained 55 cents to 5.87, or 10%, on 1.7 million shares.
Ultra-short ProShares Ultra VIX Short-Term Futures ETF (UVXY) jumped 1.71 to 18.92, reaching as high as 19.50 today. VelocityShares Daily 2x VIX ST ETN (TVIX) snapped back 66 cents to 8.52.
Other gainers of note included U.S. Silica Holdings, Inc. (SLCA), up 65 cents to 11.75, Youku Inc. (YOKU) jumped 1.42 to 25.54, Synageva BioPharma Corp. (GEVA) advanced 2.16 to 37.69, and Tudou Holdings Limited (TUDO) gained 1.94 to 38.28.
Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices had a very negative afternoon on news from overseas, and only the last 10-minute snapback prevented them from closing at the lows for the day.
It was a decidedly negative day, and while we're stepping back to look at the overall pattern over the last month or so, we see a large potential head-and-shoulder bottom forming. It depends on whether or not they hold support or rally back or not.
We'll have to see how that goes in the next few days.
Good Trading!
Harry