Today was another sharply negative day and it was ugly all session. It started off with a big gap down. They went sharply lower in the morning, bounced late in the morning and then stair-stepped lower in a shallower angle, but in a definitive intraday down channel, closing just off the lows for the day. Only a late bounce in the last few minutes brought them off the lows.

Net on the day the Dow was down 348, the S&P 500 down just under 47, and the Nasdaq 100 down more than 72 1/2, a very nasty day. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) fell 14.68, or about 5 percent.

The technicals reflected the extreme sell-off. Advance-declines were more than 5 to 1 negative with 2668 down and 509 up on New York, and about 4 1/2 to 1 on Nasdaq, with 2382 to 541. Up/down volume was 1.3 billion on the downside and only 160 million on the upside on New York, a ratio of about 8 to 1 negative. But Nasdaq was worse, with 2.1 billion down and 96 million up, a ratio of 21 to 1 negative .

TheTechTrader.com board was extremely negative and almost all red. Leading the way was Apple (AAPL) at 100.10, down 9.02 on 57 million shares. The Brazilian ETF EWZ closed at 49.46, down 6.79. Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) dropped 4.71 to 57.06, Focus Media (FMCN) at 24.96 was down 2.61. Canadian Solar (CSIQ) got hammered, closing at 16.44, down 2.74 today. The USO dropped 3.89 on another drop in oil, while the DUG jumped 5.69. The QID was up 5.19, the SDS 5.55. JPM managed to advance 60 cents, along with SOV up 43 cents, the only gainers on our board today.

Other losses of note, JA Solar (JASO) was down 1.76 to 10.08, Solarfun (SOLF) down 1.15 to 10.43, Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX) dropped 1.79 to 30.86, Morgan Stanley down 1.21 to 23.21, and Cree Inc. (CREE) dropped 1.50 to 21.44.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices had an extremely negative session, testing Monday's lows and taking them out nominally, closing below them on the Nasdaq 100 and just above them on the S&P 500. We'll see if there's any serious downside follow-through or whether they can right the ship tomorrow. I'll be curious to see what results from the bailout bill vote in the House of Representatives tomorrow.

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.