Good Morning, Traders. A slow float sideways to down in the markets characterized Monday's trade, giving us a rather lackluster session in which the S&P dropped 3.17, the Dow fell by 11.13 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 9.48. All of the above happened on extremely low overall volume which is interestingly strange given that we are deep in the middle of earnigs season. Total turnover on the NYSE fell by 13% as compared to Friday's numbers, and by 19% on the Nasdaq. It should be noted that Friday was options expiry, although volume was only noticeably higher on the Nasdaq and not NYSE. All in all a flat session, with Coal and Insurance stocks dominating the ShadowTrader Core Sector List and not much else doing. Homebuilders, natural gas providers, and refiners/drillers were weak. Breadth was negative on both exchanges and advance decline lines closed relatively weak as well. The chart below of the Nasdaq Composite daily basically sums up how we are just in a holding pattern in the near-term. The Nasdaq has sold off into the middle of the range of the current month and is not far off from where it started on April Fool's day. Near-term bias is sideways to down and overall bias remains up. Consider more of a hit and run style of trading, ie: shorter term swings in the current market as there is no sign of a break higher currently and the Nasdaq is quite ambigous here and acting as a drag on the S&P and Dow.

Peter Reznicek is the Chief Equity Strategist and a principal of the Prana Fund, a domestic hedge fund, and ShadowTrader, a subsidiary of thinkorswim which provides coaching and education to its clients on both intraday and swing trading of equities. For a free trial to the full version of The Big Picture or to learn about ShadowTrader's other services, visit shadowtrader.net or send an email to preznicek@shadowtrader.net.