The indices had a firm Friday, but the action looked slow and tedious, although they did move steadily higher after a morning pullback.  The Nasdaq closed a lot better than the blue chips, with the S&P 500 and Dow selling off in the last hour or so.

Net on the day the Dow was up 23 1/2, the S&P 3 1/2, the Nasdaq 100 7, and the key today was the SOX Index, up nearly 9 points and closing not far from the high for the day, bolstering Nasdaq for much of the session.

Advance/declines were a little bit better than 3 to 2 positive on both New York and Nasdaq.  Up/down volume on New York was about 8 to 5 positive on a total of about 1.4 billion traded.  Nasdaq traded a little less than 1 2/3 billion, with a nearly 3 to 1 positive ratio on advancing/declining volume.

TheTechTrader.com board was mixed, but there were some outstanding issues today.  NeoMagic, which we traded early in the session, exploded on phenomenal earnings news, trading more than 25 million shares, or more than 3 times its float, and advanced 4.88, or about 126% for the day.

Other gainers of note, model portfolio position REDF went to a new 5 ½ year high today, exploding in the last hour, closing at 21, up more than 2 points on more than 1 million shares.

ENER snapped back 1.78 today with a minor breakout in the afternoon on more than 1.1 million shares.

Other stocks of note, low-priced ALOY was up 58 cents on more than 1 million shares. SVNX snapped back 44 cents today.  VRTX was up 62 cents, and SWIR up 41 cents.

On the downside the loss leaders were HURC, which despite making a new all-time high this morning then sold off 1.70 and closed down 95 cents on the day.  ATEA gave back 91 cents, and TZOO 39 cents, with RVSN off 37 cents.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, after yesterday's severe test of key short-term support was successful, the indices managed to bounce back towards overhead resistance, pressing the 1263 area, which is resistance on the SPX, and getting through short-term resistance at 1690, closing at 1692.6 on the NDX.

So we'll see if that's significant or not.  Both indices did break above their declining tops lines of the last four days.  It could augur well, but I was not thrilled by the shallow angle of ascent on the rally today, and that could mean we are headed for lower levels unless we get a thrust right out of the gates on Monday.

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.