The stock market had three distinct parts of the session on Tuesday. The indices started out lower, came down sharply in the morning setting new lows for the pullback, and then turned around sharply as the oscillators became very oversold and the indices reached the bottom of the trend channel. They had a very sharp snapback, moving from 1888 NDX to 1926. The S&P 500 moved from 1304 to 1325. They consolidated at around lunch hour and then moved higher in the afternoon, but couldn't follow through on the nominal breakout, rolled over, and came down hard, giving back between a half and five-eighths of their gains, doing Fibonacci retracements.

Net on the day the Dow was down 35, the S&P 500 down 3 3/4, and the Nasdaq 100 down 9 1/2. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) managed to gain 1.6.

But the technicals were definitively negative, particularly on advance-declines, which were 22 to 9 1/2 negative on New York and 21 to 8 on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was a little worse than 7 to 6 negative on New York, with a little over 1.3 billion traded. More than 2.1 billion was traded on Nasdaq, with a little less than 2 to 1 negative plurality over declining over advancing volume.

TheTechTrader.com board was mostly negative, but there were some outstanding performances in the junior oils. Chart of the Week Pyramid Oil (PDO) exploded in the morning, ran all the way to 46, hitting a new all-time high, reversed sharply and came down around 4 1/4 but still ended up 3 3/4 on the day on 1 1/2 million shares, heavy volume for that stock.

Mexco Energy (MXC) had a huge negative reversal, dropping from 55.87 to 43.70, a loss of more than 12 points before bouncing a bit on the close, but still down 3.73 on the day, a big negative reversal day there.

Royale Energy (ROYL), also one of our recent Charts of the Week, was sharply higher in the morning, up to 14.70, a new multi-year high, but pulled back substantially. It was still up 1.91 on the day at 13.15 on 8.9 million, very heavy volume for that stock.

Portfolio position Acordia Pharmaceuticals (ACOR) at 31.64 was up 48 cents. Emcore (EMKR) at 7.82 was up 12 cents.

But for the most part, most stocks were down today. Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) fell 1.88, Canadian Solar (CSIQ) 1.38, Solarfun (SOLF) 34 cents, and JA Solar (JASO) 33 cents.

Brigham Exploration (BEXP) had a difficult day, down 1.80, as did Northern Oil & Gas (NOG) down 79 cents and GeoResources (GEOI) down 67 cents. So, despite some firming in the various junior oils, there was some weakness. Although oil had a very narrow day today, profit-taking did set in on some of the junior oils.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices made new lows for the move, bounced sharply mid-day, but gave back a bunch of it at the end of the day, closing down on the session for the most part. We'll see what kind of follow-through we get, whether the indices can stabilize and move back up or whether they have more downside follow-through and more testing to do before they can make any upside progress.

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.