The indices had a definitive down-day with a very sharp sell-off in the morning, a mid-day snapback rally which recovered about half the earlier losses & then a sharp rollover to new lows after the FOMC minutes came out. Wall Street pretty much did not like what it heard.

In the last hour or so they did bounce back and closed off the lows, but net on the day the Dow was down 89 1/4, the S&P 500 9 1/2, and the Nasdaq 100 nearly 19. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) was down 5.30.

Advance-declines were negative by 23 to 10 on New York and by about 19 Ã,½ to 10 Ã,½ on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was better than 2 to 1 negative on New York on total volume of better than 1.5 billion. Nasdaq traded just under 2 billion shares with a nearly 3 to 1 negative ratio.

TheTechTrader.com board was mostly lower. The big loser today was Dendreon (DNDN), which gave back 3.92 on 50 million shares, closing at 18.23. That’s 7 Ã,¼ points off just yesterday morning’s high. So it’s a bit oversold and perhaps due for a bounce.

U.S Global Investors (GROW) was down 1.52 and Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) 1.14, and after a strong morning in the solar energy group they reversed sharply lower, some closing negatively on the day. Ascent Solar (ASTI) was up just 8 cents after being up more than a dollar in the morning, setting a new all-time high at 10.80, closing at 9.83.

Other stocks of note on the plus side, FuelTek (FTEK) snapped back 59 cents from recent losses. Chindex (CHDX) gained another 29 cents and tested 20 today.

Other losses of note, Jones Soda (JSDA) was down 87 cents to 23 on 3 million. Nuvelo (NUVO), also in the biotech sector, was down 97 cents on 29.6 million.

Portfolio position Research Frontiers (REFR) was down 49 cents, Radio Shack (RSH) also 49 cents, and Sigma Designs (SIGM) 44 cents.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices rolled over and broke through 21- and 40-day moving average support on the hourly charts, and despite the snapback late in the session still closed weak on the session.

I think the market action over the next day or so is going to be key to determining the direction of the short-term trend. We’ll soon see whether they hold and rebound or if this is the beginning of a new pullback period.

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.