The stock market indices ended the week on a flat to mixed note, but had some intra-day gyrations. The day started out down, snapped back to resistance, and rolled over to the session lows within the first 90 minutes or so. Then they staged a steady but choppy comeback taking the Nasdaq 100 from 1830 up to 1857 and the S&P 500 from 1068 to 1084 by early afternoon. At that point they backed off, tested, broke initial support, tried to snapback but then went to lower lows just before the closing bell, and firmed up just a tad.

Net on the day, the Dow was down 8.99 at 10,143.81, the S&P 500 was up 3.07 at 1076.76, and the Nasdaq 100 down 6.07 at 1838.52.

Advance/declines, however, were positive by 22 to 8 on the New York Stock Exchange and 18 to 8 positive on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 2 1/2 to 1 positive on New York on total volume of 2.5 billion. Nasdaq traded a hefty 3.5 billion shares today and had a 22 to 13 positive ratio. The balancing of the Russell 3000 had a lot to do with the increased volume traded late in the session.

TheTechTrader.com board, as a result, was mostly higher, however. Leading the way today were some of the large caps. Goldman Sachs (GS) was up 4.68 to 139.66, Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) up 2.67 to 121.00, and Baidu, Inc. (BIDU) up 2.30 to 76.10.

In addition, Dendreon Corp. (DNDN) jumped 1 point to 37.01. Tibco Software Inc. (TIBX), which we traded today, was up 1.22 to 12.54 or 10.76%, and Accenture (ACN), which we also traded today, gained 3 to 40.55. SYNNEX Corp. (SNX) was up 1.22 at 26.66, or 5%.

Among other gainers of note, A123 Systems, Inc. (AONE) was up 49 cents at 9.68, MannKind Corp. (MNKD) 55 cents at 7.11, portfolio position Neurocrine Biosciences Inc. (NBIX) 42 cents at 6.16, Netlist Inc. (NLST) 35 cents at 2.81, and Westport Innovations Inc. (WPRT) 30 cents at 16.70.

RINO International Corporation (RINO) jumped 46 cents at 13.88, Spreadtrum Communications Inc. (SPRD) 14 cents at 9.61, OmniVision Technologies Inc. (OVTI) 42 cents at 22.61, Brigham Exploration Co. (BEXP) 54 cents at 16.94, Ariba (ARBA) 89 cents at 17.74, and Acme Packet, Inc. (APKT) 82 cents at 29.38.

On the downside, the ultra-short ETFs got hammered back a little bit. The Direxion Daily Emrg Mkts Bear 3X Shares (EDZ) was down 1.51 to 42.65, and the Direxion Daily Financial Bear 3X Shares (FAZ) down 1.17 at 14.80.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were down in the morning, up mid-day, and then back down in the afternoon to close near mixed on the session. Not a very encouraging performance after such a negative week. Nonetheless, they managed to stem the tide of any further damage, at least until next week.

Harry Boxer is a technical consultant to many Wall Street hedge funds and large institutional traders, and author of TheTechTrader.com.