It was a wild session on Thursday. There was a lot of volatility, and the indices swung back and forth, and sharply so, particularly mid-day and early afternoon. But at the end of the day they managed to work their back into the plus column.

The day started out with a gap down. They made lower lows; however the NDX held the January 22 spike lows on the retest, with the S&P 500 way above them. In fact, the S&P held last week’s first pullback low near the 1320 area. That caused a very sharp spike up, snapback rally that retraced about 50 % of that move. When that stabilized, they came on again and started moving steadily higher and then accelerated into the early afternoon. The indices got up near second-tier overhead resistance, failed just beneath them, and then fell sharply, plunging through a couple minor layers of support, holding the early morning retest lows, which caused a sharp, late snapback rally.

Net on the day the Dow closed up 47, the S&P 500 up 10 1/2, and Nasdaq 100 up 12 1/3. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) was up 0.64.

The technicals swung to the plus side, with advance-declines positive by a little less than 2 to 1 on New York and by 3 to 2 on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 11 to 6 positive on New York, with just under 2 billion traded. Nasdaq traded just under 1 3/4 billion and had about a 2 to 1 ratio on advancing volume over declining volume.

TheTechTrader.com board had an active day, with several point-plus gainers. Shippers had a terrific day, with DryShips (DRYS) up 5.33 and TBS International (TBSI) 3.91, but Excel Maritime (EXM) was up just 14 cents after giving back a chunk of its early gain.

Other gainers of note, portfolio position Chindex (CHDX) gained 1.50, recent Chart of the Week Cepheid (CPHD) up 1.29, recent Chart of the Week Cree Inc. (CREE) up 2.20, and recent portfolio position EMKR up 1.67, as well as Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) up 2.77.

Recent Chart of the Week VRUS snapped back 2.03 today. WM was up 1.46. Eschelon Corp. (ELON) gained 2.16.

So, there were many point-plus gainers on our board.

On the downside, the only point-plus loser was Boxer Short IVGN, which gave back 1.31 from yesterday's big post-earnings gain. Sigma Designs (SIGM) lost 50 cents.

There was some minor weakness in the junior solar stocks, with ASTI off 33 cents, China Sunergy (CSUN) 35 cents, Canadian Solar (CSIQ) 25 cents, Akeena Solar (AKNS) down 14 cents. Solarfun Power (SOLF) gained 1cent.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, today could have been an important day for the indices, as key tests have held so far. We'll see if they can follow through to the upside and take out declining tops lines and overhead resistance to substantiate an important bottom in place.

Until that occurs they're still vulnerable and the jury is still out on which direction the market wants to go.

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.