The stock market indices suffered small losses to close out the week, but came way back from steeper losses by midday. The day started out with a move down. The indices then snapped back, failed to make new highs, and then rolled over hard. By noon they reached their session lows at 2255 on the Nasdaq100 and 1262 on the S&P 500. Then a strong rallied ensued.

The indices snapped back sharply over the rest of the session, with the NDX bouncing from 2255 to 2277, closing down .81 to 2276.70. The S&P 500 jumped from 1252 to 1272, closing at 1271.50, down just 2.35, 10 points off the low. The Dow was down 22.55 at 11,674.76, closing about 75 points off its low.

However, technicals could not make it all the way back despite the rally. Advance-declines were negative by about 17 to 13 on the New York Stock Exchange and by about 16 1/2 to 10 on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 3 to 2 negative on New York on total volume under 1.1 billion. Nasdaq traded just under 2 billion shares and had about a 4 to 3 negative ratio.

TheTechTrader.com board was narrowly mixed. Many stocks on our board had a solid day today. Asia Entertainment & Resources Ltd. (AERL) was up 70 cents to 11.72, Affymax, Inc. (AFFY) 1.04 to 7.99, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ANAC) 75 cents to 8.12, Immucor Inc. (BLUD) 1.65 to 20.96, BSQUARE Corp. (BSQR) 38 cents to 10.75, China MediaExpress Holdings, Inc. (CCME) 1.16 to 17.49, and Camelot Information Systems Inc. (CIS) 2.48 to 26.73.

In addition, FormFactor Inc. (FORM) advanced 62 cents to 9.69, Globe Specialty Metals, Inc. (GSM) 50 cents to 18.40, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. (GT) 63 cents to 12.90, iGo, Inc. (IGOI) 35 cents to 4.35, Kulicke & Soffa Industries Inc. (KLIC) 1.02 to 8.66, Cheniere Energy, Inc. (LNG) 64 cents to 7.20, LSB Industries Inc. (LXU) 1.06 to 27.37, Molycorp, Inc. (MCP) 1.54 to 54.40, and MGM Resorts International (MGM) 1.13 to 16.35. GT Solar International, Inc. (SOLR) jumped 55 cents to 10.50.

Syntel, Inc. (SYNT) had a strong session, up 3.64 to 54.15. Low-priced TranS1, Inc. (TSON) was up 41%, or 83 cents, to 2.88, and T-3 Energy Services Inc. (TTES) up 4.90 to 44.61. Apple Inc. (AAPL) also gained 2.39 to 336.12 and reached an all-time new high today at 336.35 earlier in the session.

On the downside, point-plus losers included Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. (CMG) down 2.24 to 224.26, OmniVision Technologies Inc. (OVTI) down 1.28 to 27.21, and Local.com Corp. (LOCM), which got hammered after earnings and another announcement, falling 1.73 to 5.19.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were down the first part of the session, and sharply higher in the second part of the session, but did not manage to get back into the plus column for the first losses of the week.

In any case, they did survive a severe test at key support around the 1262 level. We’ll be watching S&P 500 1262 level early next week for signs of a potential rollover.

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