Good Morning, Traders. A slight gap up and a slow grind higher defined Tuesday's rather lackluster trade. The Dow continues to show relative strength to the S&P and Nasdaq, tacking on over 73 points in yesterday's session. Sectors of note were the Oil Services ($OSX), Natural Gas ($XNG) and Gold ($GOX). Hmmm, metals and energy, big surprise! Where have we heard that before? Breadth was positive at just over 2:1 on the NYSE but not so hot on the weak as usual Nasdaq with sellers in Biotechs causing the advancing volume to beat out the declining volume on that exchange by only 1.21 to 1. The advance decline situation was skewed in the same direction with a +901 closing reading on the NYSE versus a rather paltry +398 close on the Nasdaq. Overall very little to report technically as it was an inside day yesterday, where neither the high or low of the day were able to pierce out of the prior day's range. Inside days simply tell us the market is taking a pause and will more than likely continue the primary trend which is still upwards. Near-term bias is, however, sideways to down.

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.