The downtrend extended today, now in its fifth day, as the indices ended decidedly lower and near the lows for the day going away. 

The day started out with some very choppy action in the morning.  We did have a mid-day rally try that failed at resistance.  The indices, particularly the blue chips, then sold off steadily in the afternoon.  The Nasdaq held up better and was off a lesser amount today due to the SOX index being up nicely  and ,as a result, the decline was led by the blue chips.

The Dow was down 82 points, the S&P 500 8, the Nasdaq 100  4 ¼, and the SOX Index up 5.83.  That was one of the primary reasons why the Nasdaq 100 was only down 4 points today.  The semiconductor sector was strong, but a weak market overall.

Technically, advance-declines were about 17 to 15 negative on New York, but about 17 to 13 positive on Nasdaq.  Up/down volume was negative on New York by 5 to 3 on total volume of about 1.7 billion.  Nasdaq was positive by about 4 to 3 on total volume of 1.8 billion.

TheTechTrader.com board was active, with several outstanding stocks to the upside.  BCRX, on a very big announcement with Roche Pharmaceuticals, was up 4.43 on 34 million shares today, closing at 16.24.   BOOM snapped back 1.20 on 1 ¾ million and broke out of a three-week base pattern.

Other stocks on the upside, but at much smaller fractions were FORD up 46 cents, DCAI up 36 cents, ALOY up 44 cents, and ABGX up 57 cents.

On the downside, CNVR was down 1.03, JMDT 69 cents, and most other stocks were up or down just a fraction today.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices reached the bottom of their five-day down channels today.  The hourly chart patterns show that the moving averages have rolled over and crossed, and the trend lines have been violated, so we could see even lower levels, but a snapback attempt may be in order shortly

Tomorrow should be an important and very interesting session.

Good trading!

Harry Boxer is a technical consultant to many Wall Street hedge funds and large institutional traders, and author of TheTechTrader.com, a real-time diary of his day, swing and intermediate-term trades. For more of Harry Boxer, sign up for a FREE 15-day trial to his Real-Time Technical Trading Diary, or sign up for a Free 30-Day Trial to his Top Charts of the Week service.