The indices had a positive start to the week price-wise, but the participation in terms of breadth was rather muted.

The day started out with the indices gapping up slightly after being down in overnight futures, and they moved back down and retested rather sharply so on the S&P 500, but it held support near 1320-21, with the NDX holding up much better.

The indices then started a 3-wave rally that lasted into early afternoon. They went to new highs on the Nasdaq 100 for this bounce, but couldn’t break out above Friday's highs on the S&P 500. They backed and filled in the last hour, came on again and tried to break out, but once again failed and backed off.

Net on the day the Dow was up 58, the S&P 500 7.84, the Nasdaq 100 up 19 1/3 and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) up 5 1/2.

As stated earlier, the technicals were less than exciting with advance-declines about 165 issues higher on New York and only about 73 issues higher on Nasdaq. The up/down volume was 4 to 3 positive on Nasdaq on a total volume of under 2.1 billion, and New York traded a little more than 1 1/3 billion, with about an 8 to 5 positive ratio.

TheTechTrader.com board was mostly higher, with quite a few point-plus gainers. Chart of the Week Chindex (CHDX) was up 3.09 today. Solar stocks and shippers again had a strong session. DryShips (DRYS) was up 4.50, TBS International (TBSI) 1.91 and Excel Maritime (EXM) 1.85. In the junior solar group, Canadian Solar (CSIQ) was up 1.47, Ascent Solar (ASTI) 1.26, and Solarfun (SOLF) 1.12.

Other stocks of note on the plus side, recent Chart of the Day Cree Inc. (CREE) was up 1.82, MFLX up 2.33 on top of last week's sharp gain, Sigma Designs (SIGM) 1.42, and Charts of the Day VSCI up 59 cents along with VNUS up 1.22.

On the downside, point-plus losers WM gave back 1.28, and Boxer Shorts Vitrogen 1.77 and Covant 1.13 were point losers.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices made new snapback rally highs on the NDX but not the SPX, and failed to get through KEY short-term resistance on the NDX at 1798-1800, SPX 1341-44. Until they do, the jury is still out as to the short-term direction.

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.