The stock market indices had an up-day to start the week, but the path was sloppy. They started off with some gains and then sold off sharply to new lows for the entire pullback, reaching 1795 on the Nasdaq 100 and 1061 on the S&P 500. At that point they started a 5-wave advance that last several hours until late into the day, reaching new session highs with about 30-40 minutes to go. They pulled back sharply, and then bounced into the close again.

Net on the day at the end of the day, the Dow was up 56.53 at 10,154.43, the S&P 500 up 6.37 at 1071.25, and Nasdaq 100 managed to gain 15.80 at 1819.28.

Advance/declines were nearly 2 to 1 positive on New York Stock Exchange, but on Nasdaq they were just 3 to 2 positive. Up/down volume was 2 to 1 positive on New York with total volume under a billion at 940 million. Up/down volume on Nasdaq was 2 to 1 positive as well with total volume at just over 1.7 billion.

TheTechTrader.com board, as a result, was mixed, but there were several substantial gainers. Leading the way, Google Inc. (GOOG) jumped 6.58 at 466.18, Cree Inc. (CREE) 1.78 at 66.90, and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) 1.45 at 119.94.

Other gainers of note: Cirrus Logic Inc. (CRUS) advanced 33 cents at 17.49, RealD INC. (RLD) 34 cents at 19.85, and Trina Solar Ltd. (TSL) in the solar energy group 82 cents at 23.08.

Most other stocks on the upside gained just very small fractions today.

On the downside, Apple Inc. (AAPL) lost 4.32 at 245.58, BP Exploration plc (BP) 1.35 at 35.75 on heavy volume, and Transocean Ltd. (RIG) 4.00 at 48.08 in that same sector.

Ultra-short ETF Direxion Daily Emrg Mkts Bear 3X Shares (EDZ) lost 1.78 at 42.48.

Other stocks of note on the downside were Goldman Sachs (GS) down 49 cents at 145.68, IDT Corporation (IDT) 49 cents at 14.84, and Valassis Communications Inc. (VCI) 83 cents at 28.56.

In the ultra-short ETF sector the iPath S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures ETN (VXX) lost 84 cents at 26.53, and the Direxion Daily Small Cap Bear 3X Shares (TZA) 40 cents at 38.87, along with the Direxion Daily Large Cap Bear 3X Shares (BGZ) down 30 cents at 16.00 even.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were up early, pulled back sharply in the morning, and then stair-stepped their way higher over the next several hours to new highs for the day before a late pullback brought them off their highs, only to bounce again into the close to finish positive on the session.

It was generally a positive start to the week but somewhat suspect as the overall patterns appear to be consolidation patterns ahead of more potential downside. We’ll see if the hold of today’s lows was significant or not.

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