The stock market indices had a wild, back-and-forth, wedging-type session today, consolidating and closing not far off the close of yesterday in a mixed session.

The day started out with the indices moving up sharply. The Nasdaq 100 got up to near 2347 and the S&P 500 got up to 1338.80, but couldn’t do much after that point. They rolled over hard in the next hour, and then bounced, retested successfully, and then had a much sharper rally by midday. However, that fell short of the earlier highs, and they rolled back. In the last couple hours they backed and filled at a the higher angle, and closed barely ahead on the NDX and down on the Dow and S&P 500.

Net on the day, the Dow down 17.26 at 12,409.49, and the S&P 500 down 2.03 at 1333.51. The Nasdaq 100 was up 0.54 at 2332.88.

Advance-declines were negative by 3 to 2 on both the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. Up/down volume was about 5 to 3 negative on New York, with total volume of just under 900 million shares. Nasdaq traded about 1.8 billion shares and had about a 3 to 2 negative plurality on declining volume over advancing volume.

TheTechTrader.com had an exceptionally strong day today. Leading the way was Molycorp, Inc. (MCP), which we picked at the opening and which jumped from 62.56 to 68.79, closing at 68.45, not far off the high, up 6.39 on 14 million today.

Among other stocks in that rare-earth group, which had an exceptional session, Rare Element Resources Ltd. (REE) jumped 2.16 to 15.30, Avalon Rare Metals Inc. (AVL) was up 83 cents to 9.52, and China Shen Zhou Mining & Resources, Inc. (SHZ) rose 67 cents to 5.40 -- all on heavy volume.

In addition, Immunogen Inc. (IMGN) had a spectacular session, jumping 2.50 to 11.80. Double Eagle Petroleum Co. (DBLE) was up 2.10 to 11.29, Asia Entertainment & Resources Ltd. (AERL) 1.00 to 8.35, and Harvest Natural Resources Inc. (HNR) 1.16 to 15.71.

Retailers had a very good day as well. Bed Bath & Beyond, Inc. (BBBY) was up 5.16 to 54.55, Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) 2.83 to 77.82, and Pier 1 Imports, Inc. (PIR) 1.11 to 11.65.

Other gainers of note included VirnetX Holding Corp (VHC) up 1.37 to 27.25, and Superconductor Technologies Inc. (SCON) 55 cents to 3.59. Northern Oil and Gas, Inc. (NOG) snapped back 1.32 to 25.48. Keynote Systems Inc. (KEYN) had a big day, up 2.44 to 20.79, and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) managed to gain 2.15 up 184.91.

However, some of the other large-cap stocks were narrowly mixed or lower. Apple Inc. (AAPL) was up 4 cents today to 338.08, and Goldman Sachs (GS) up 51 cents to 162.40. Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. (CMG) lost 1.06 to 274.70, and Travelzoo Inc. (TZOO) lost 3.13 to 74.75.

So, it was a fairly mixed session and large-cap stocks were mixed or lower today.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were basically sharply up and down in the morning, narrowed a bit by midday, and then narrowed more by the end of the day in a coiling or wedging-type pattern, which closed near the edge of that wedge

There was no direction today, as it was more of a consolidation day again.

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