It was another ugly session today.  Although we had intraday rallies that looked promising, none of them were able to get through resistance, and the indices closed near the lows for the day going away, as the declined accelerated in the afternoon.

The Dow closed just a tad above 10,700, down 86 Ã,½ today. The S&P 500 was down 12.71, and the Nasdaq 100 down just 3.46 with the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) down 2.30.

But technicals were extremely negative again, with advance-declines negative by 26 Ã,½ to 6 Ã,½ on New York and about 23 to 8 on Nasdaq.  Up/down volume was also very negative, by 5 Ã,½ to 1 on New York and 3 to 1 on Nasdaq.

Total volume was very heavy today, with nearly 2.3 billion traded on New York and just under 2 Ã,½ billion on Nasdaq.

TheTechTrader.com board was extremely negative for the most part, except for Apple Computer (AAPL), which had a stellar day, up 1.33, and Qualcomm (QCOM) up 65 cents. That was pretty much it.

On the downside, it was an extremely negative day on our board, with Baidu.com (BIDU) down 6, Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) down 3.87, DXP Enterprises (DXPE) 3.17, Pacific Ethanol (PEIX) 2.89, Travelzoo (TZOO)  1.51, Rediff.com India (REDF) another 1.10, and MED 1.70

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the decline off the April highs continues, accelerating off the early June highs in a very distinct down-channel, closing at the long-term up-trend line off the October 2004 lows on the S&P 500 and near key support on the Nasdaq 100 as well.

Downside momentum is strong, and intraday rallies continue to fail at resistance.  Until thatââ,¬â"¢s reversed, the trend is your friend and the trend is lower.

However, based on the closing NYSE McClellan oscillator at -197 and the VIX (CBOE Volatility Index) trading at its highest level since March 2004. Iââ,¬â"¢m looking for a snapback rally as early as tomorrow morning.

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.