We had some volatility again today, but the indices had a very strong close.

The day started with a solid opening, followed by a very quick sell-off to new pullback lows. At that point, the indices became very short-term oversold, and I alerted our subscribers to the possibility of a sharp bounce. We certainly got that, as the Nasdaq 100 went from 1916 to 1938 inside of an hour. The S&P 500 during the same time went from 1505 to 1519. They pulled back to about 50% of their gains to test successfully and then had an equal second leg up that took the Nasdaq 100 up as high as 1943, and the S&P 500 got up to 1523. A late afternoon pullback again successfully tested support at the intraday price and moving averages , and they ran back up near the highs for the day in the last hour.

The Dow closed up 56.42, about 150 points off the low. The S&P 500 was up 9.35, 18 points off the low. The Nasdaq 100 closed up 19.20, about 25 points off the low. That was fed by the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX), which was up nearly 15 points today, or 3 percent.

As often happens when indices reverse from morning losses, the technicals did not get too far into the plus column, although they did close positive, by about 18 to 15 on advance-declines on New York and only 15 to 14 on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was better than 2 to 1 positive on New York with about 1.5 billion traded. On the other hand, Nasdaq traded more than 2 billion shares, and had 3 to 1 positive ratio on advancing volume over declining volume. So a much stronger day on Nasdaq in terms of the up/down volume.

TheTechTrader.com board was mostly higher. There were some fractional losers, but the day was led by far by FuelTek (FTEK), yesterday’s Chart of the Day, which advanced another 4 over the 5 Ã,¼ points yesterday, so more than a $9 gain in just two days. Another contract announcement from Hoku Scientific (HOKU) spurred the stock much higher, as the low-priced stock advanced 2.65 to close at 9.60 on more than 26 Ã,½ million shares traded.

Other stocks of note, Metabolix (MBLX) snapped back 91 cents, Chart of the Week Immersion Corp. (IMMR) was up 64 cents, Chart of the Week Industrial Services of America (IDSA) was up 35 cents, old favorite Chindex (CHDX) up 82 cents, CV Therapeutics (CVTX) up 85 cents, and Global Solutions (GSOL) up another 58 cents today. Sigma Designs (SIGM) managed to move ahead by 39 cents.

e-Future Information Technology (EFUT) gave back another 1.52 from its recent sharp gains. That was the only point-plus loser on our board. Everything else was down small fractions if it was down at all.

Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, a very sharp spike lower in the morning completed the decline. That was followed by a 5-wave advance today that took back about 75% of the losses on the NDX and about 50% on the S&P. We’ll see if we can get a follow-through on Friday. However, TheTechTrader.com is closed, as we’re appearing at the Traders Expo in San Diego tomorrow. Look forward to seeing any of you who may be able to attend.

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.