Another strong day for the indices spurred the markets higher in back to back sessions, and they closed at the highs for the day going away. The day started out with a strong surge from the get-go. They backed off and retested but held intraday moving average support. They then ran back up and made new highs on the Dow and S&P 500, but failed to do so on the Nasdaq 100 by mid-day. They then pulled back in the early afternoon to retest, but that was once again successful and then a very strong surge occurred over the last two hours to take the indices to their closing levels.

The Dow was up 175, the S&P 500 up 22.33, the Nasdaq 100 up 28.34, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) up 7.19.

Technicals were a little less than 4 to 1 positive on advance-declines on New York and less than 3 to 1 on Nasdaq. Up/down volume, however, was the story today, 5 1/2 to 1 positive on New York, although volume was lighter at about 1 1/3 billion. Nasdaq volume was just under 2 billion, and had a 4 to 1 positive ratio.

However, TheTechTrader.com board was extremely mixed, as several Chinese stocks backed off, shipping stocks were mixed, and some of the momentum leaders did not participate well.

Among the outstanding stocks on the China side, Aluminum Corp. of China (ACH) was up 3.33, and Fuwei Films (FFHL) was up 2.75. That was the Nasdaq percentage leading gainer today, up 64% on 4 3/4 million.

Cepheid (CPHD) continued its strong snapback, up 1.28 today, and the XLE was up 1.62.

Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) had an outstanding session today, up 1.77 on 1.2 million.

Hoku Scientific (HOKU) was extremely strong in the morning, gapping up more than 3 points, but gave back a big chunk of it and slid lower in the afternoon. Still, it held onto a gain of 1.85 on 9.5 million shares. But that was 1 1/2 off the session high.

On the downside, loss leader was China Natural Resources (CHNR), which exploded yesterday. It did open strong and got up as high as 32.85, but closed at 26.70, giving back 6 points, down 4.80 on the session. Global Solutions (GSOL) lost 1.78. Solarfun (SOLF) down 1 in a weaker solar energy group for the most part, and Ascent Solar (ASTI) was near unchanged.

In the shipping sector, DryShips (DRYS) off 65 cents and Excel Maritime (EXM) off 73 cents were rather narrowly traded today.

Taser (TASR) had an outstanding session, up 72 cents, closing near 16, at 15.94.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the importance of today's session was that key overhead and formidable resistance at 1490-92 zone on the S&P 500 was taken out, and the Dow managed to get back over 13,600, closing near 13,620 today. Today's morning pullback held intraday support, as the market continued higher and the shorts got squeezed and were not easily let off the hook today.

Harry Boxer is a technical consultant to many Wall Street hedge funds and large institutional traders, and author of TheTechTrader.com, a real-time diary of his day, swing and intermediate-term trades. For more of Harry Boxer, sign up for a free 15-day trial to his Real-Time Technical Trading Diary, or sign up for a free 30-day trial to his Top Charts of the Week service.