The stock market indices today ended mixed, but they had some powerful swings intraday. The Nasdaq 100 opened lower, as did the S&P 500. They bounced back to new highs on the NDX, but failed to do so on the S&P 500 by a small amount. At that point they dropped sharply, tested support, bounced, made lower highs, and then rolled over hard to make new lows for the day with an hour to go. When there was no downside follow-through, and support held on the SPX in particular, they bounced back sharply in the last hour to close up on the day on the Dow, and down on the SPX and NDX.

Net on the day, the Dow was up 6.74 at 12,239.89, the S&P 500 down 3.69 at 1320.88, and the Nasdaq 100 down 2.66 at 2360.95.

Advance-declines were 18 to 11 negative on the New York Stock Exchange, and about 2 to 1 negative on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was a little better than 2 to 1 negative on New York on total volume of just under 1.1 billion shares. Nasdaq traded 1.8 billion shares and had a 2 to 1 negative volume ratio as well.

TheTechTrader.com board had a decidedly negative day, but there were quite a few stocks up on our board, and multiple point-plus gainers at that. Leading the way was Stratasys Inc. (SSYS), up 4.98 to 41.08. The other big winner for today was Buffalo Wild Wings Inc. (BWLD), up 6.11 to 53.50.

In addition, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. (CMG) added 5.25 to 252.51, and Apple Inc. (AAPL) 2.96 to 358.16, hitting an all-time new high at 359. Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) gained 2.24 to 185.30.

Other point-plus gainers of note included InterDigital, Inc. (IDCC) up 1.43 to 56.25, and IDT Corporation (IDT), one of our favorites, up 1.35 to 26.15. Photronics Inc. (PLAB) jumped 1.10 to 7.82, and the Direxion Daily Emrg Mkts Bear 3X Shares (EDZ) gained 1.43 to 22.68.

Among other gainers of note, China Shen Zhou Mining & Resources, Inc. (SHZ), in the rare-earth group, was up 53 cents to 7.37, but that was a mixed group as many of the other stocks dropped.

One the downside, Molycorp, Inc. (MCP) gave back 1.02 to 54.38 today. Goldman Sachs (GS) fell 2.54 to 166.01, and American International Group, Inc. (AIG) 1.26 to 41.11.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were choppy today in a stair-step downward-type fashion, but at the end of the day in the last hour they rallied back to close near flat on the day with the Dow up, and the NDX and S&P 500 down.

Still, they bent, but did not break today, and the rally rolls on.

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