It was a marginally negative day for the indices, but it was also extremely sloppy and a very tedious session to watch.  The indices opened higher, but that was about it.  Then they came down hard in the morning, reached the morning lows within a half hour or so, and then worked their higher to test resistance by mid-day.  They failed there and sold off for the rest of the session, although they did have a mid-afternoon rally attempt that got them back near the highs.  When that failed they came back down again to retest the lows.

Net on the day, it was marginally negative, as I said.  The Dow was pretty close to unchanged all day but closed down about 12 3/4 at the end of the day.  The S&P was up 1 penny, the Nasdaq 100 up 7, the Nasdaq Composite up 7 1/4, and the SOX Semiconductor Index up about 3 1/3.

The technicals were negative by about 9 to 8 on advance-declines on New York and almost 2 to 1 on Nasdaq.  Volume was lighter today, with a total of less than 1.2 billion traded on New York and a little more than 1.3 billion on Nasdaq.  New York had a 6 to 5 ratio of declining volume over advancing volume, and Nasdaq's ratio was 8 to 5 negative.

TheTechTrader.com board was narrowly mixed except for just a few issues, and those were mostly to the downside.  Dynamic Materials (BOOM) got hit, especially late in the session and fell 2 3/4 to close at 30.  Forward Industries (FORD) experienced some profit-taking from its recent run and gave back 1.68 today.  The alternative energy sector got hit, with Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) down 80 cents, Evergreen Solar (ESLR) down 80 cents, and DayStar  Technologies (DSTI) down 21 cents.

Air T (AIRT) also gave back 77 cents, closing under 17.

On the plus side, China Yuchai (CYD) advanced 1.75 and WorldGate Communications (WGAT) 58 cents.

Other than that, the rest of my board was extremely narrowly fractionally mixed both ways, up and down.

Stepping back and reviewing the overall patterns, the worst part about today was that the inability for the market to snap back and rally created what appears to be consolidation or potential bear flags, with the NDX right at last week's lows.

Key short-term support here was severely tested late in the session and may be tested again tomorrow morning.  We'll be watching the 1477-78 zone on the NDX and the 1179 area on the S&P.

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.