The market had a strong start for the week ,but fizzled out early and then sold off sharply in a three-wave decline until mid-afternoon, at which point the sharp sell-off resulted in a snapback rally that lasted into the close.

Net on the day the indices for most part were down, except for the Dow, which did manage to get into plus territory. The Dow closed at 13,346.78, up 21, the S&P 500 at 1503.15, was down 2.70. The Nasdaq 100 at 1888.08 was down 10.71. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) was off 0.76 today, about 4 points off the earlier high.

Technicals were 2 to 1 negative on advance-declines on New York and more than that on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 8 to 5 negative on New York with total volume of a little more than 1 1/3 billion. Nasdaq traded 1.9 billion with about an 11 to 7 negative plurality.

TheTechTrader.com board was mostly narrowly changed today. There were some point-plus gainers and losers. On the plus side, one of our stocks to watch this week, Synalloy (SYNL), jumped from the get-go,closing up 2.57 to a new all-time high.

Geron (GERN) jumped strongly at the opening, and closed up 1.05 today on 8.7 million, a gain of 15%. One of our portfolio positions DG FastChannel (DGIT) gained another 51 cents today. Ceragon Networks (CRNT) jumped 42 cents, closing at 8.22. LJ International (JADE), one of this week’s Charts of the Week, was up 68 cents on 2 1/3 million.

MEDTOX Scientific (MTOX) was up 79 cents, and Transcend Services (TRCR) up 36 cents.

On the downside, the only point-plus loser on my board was DXP Enterprises (DXPE), down 1.33. FuelTek (FTEK) gave back 67 cents, Jones Soda (JSDA) lost 98 cents, OSI Systems (OSIS) 42 cents, and Sigma Designs (SIGM) 75 cents today. Portfolio position SPEC gave back 64 cents.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices came down sharply after some early strength, but managed to claw back in the last 1 Ã,½ hours to buffer the losses. But the overall action of the last several session now appears to be toppy, and we’ll see if there’s any downside extension and takeout of last week’s lows.

Key levels to watch are today’s lows at NDX 1878 and last week’s lows around 1874-5. S&P lows today at 1498 and last week’s lows around 1492 will be carefully watched. Resistance is at the 1906-09 zone on the NDX, and 1511-14 zone on the S&P 500.

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.