The stock market indices ended near the zero-line today and were mixed and choppy. The day started out with a move up off the opening, followed by a quick pullback that held support, and then they were off to the races again. The indices had a sharp move on the Nasdaq 100, twice making new rally highs, but the S&P 500 did not cooperate and could not even get over yesterday's late high.

At that point the negative divergence resulted in a rollover pullback that saw the NDX drop from 1864 down to 1841. The SPX dropped from 1099 down to 1087.50. They did bounce in the afternoon, got to resistance and backed off, but then came on again in the last 10-15 minutes to close near the afternoon highs, but only mixed on the session.

Net on the day, the Dow was up just 3.70 at 10,366.72, the S&P 500 was actually down 17 cents at 1095.17, and Nasdaq 100 was up 8.38 at 1853.41.

Advance/declines moved negatively in the afternoon and stayed that way with a 16 to 13 negative plurality on New York Stock Exchange and about a 15 to 11 negative ratio on Nasdaq. Total volume was about 1 billion on New York with about a 3 to 2 negative ratio. Up/down volume on Nasdaq was 1.3 million issues to the upside and 820 issues down, about a 13 to 8 positive ratio, on total volume of 2.1 billion.

So, it was a mixed session, to say the least, and as a result the vast majority of stocks on TheTechTrader.com board were narrowly mixed. There were very few point-plus changes today, but among those were Acme Packet, Inc. (APKT), reaching an all-time new high today, up 1.72 at 31.86. Trina Solar Ltd. (TSL) was up 1.02 at 21.80, and portfolio position Westport Innovations Inc. (WPRT) up 1.15 at 17.95.

Google Inc. (GOOG) jumped 2.14 to 491.34, but most of the other large-cap stocks were narrowly changed. Apple Inc. (AAPL) was up just 93 cents today, and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) was off 35 cents, so you can see very narrow changes, even in the larger higher-priced stocks.

The only point-plus loser on the board today was Goldman Sachs (GS), down 1.19 to 139.06.

Other stocks of note on the plus side include Isilon Systems, Inc. (ISLN) up 61 cents to 14.59, Keryx Biopharmaceuticals Inc. (KERX) up 55 cents to 4.11 on 7 million today, L&L Energy, Inc. (LLEN) 42 cents to 10.02, OmniVision Technologies Inc. (OVTI) 52 cents to 22.97, and RINO International Corporation (RINO) 47 cents to 14.41.

New portfolio position iPath S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures ETN (VXX) was up 93 cents at 25.93, while the Direxion Daily Financial Bear 3X Shares (FAZ) was up 29 cents at 14.03.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were up in the morning, down mid-day, and back up in the afternoon to close near mixed on the day. The positive thing about the day is that price and moving average support on the hourly charts held key levels.

We'll see if they can extend this tomorrow or whether those support levels that held today finally do give way and we pull back a little more.

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