Narrowly Positive Day, But Volatile
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The stock market indices had a narrowly positive day at the finish, but it was volatile.The day started out with a big gap to the upside. The S&P 500 ran up to 1439, a nominal new high, but could not be confirmed by the NDX, and failed at 2800. They rolled over sharply in the morning, tested yesterday’s lows on the NDX, and made a higher low on the S&P 500. They each had a choppy rally back to retest the highs, couldn’t get through, and then rolled over sharply in the last 30 to 45 minutes or so. Just before the close, they sharply moved back up to put them in the plus column.
Net on the day, the Dow was up 9.99 at 13,333.35. The S&P 500 was up 3.00 at 1436.56, only 3 points off its high and 4 points off the low. The Nasdaq 100 was up 6.79 at 2791.68, 7 points off the high and 15 points off the low.
Advance-declines were 16 to 13 positive on New York Stock Exchange, and 13 1/2 to 11 positive on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 3 to 2 positive on New York, with total volume of a very light 560 million shares. Nasdaq traded over 1.6 billion, and had a 3 to 2 positive volume ratio.
TheTechTrader.com board was mixed, although most of today’s activities were affected by Apple Inc. (AAPL), which ran up, rolled over to 656, and closed just under 670. That was a nice 14-point rally, up 9.20 to 669.79, about 11 cents off its high. So, a very nice close on Apple today. Google Inc. (GOOG), on the other hand, was down 1.31 to 690.88, 4 points off its high, and 10 points off its low. Amazon Inc. (AMZN) was nearly unchanged today, down only .04 to 255.64, closing just a couple points off the lows as well as a couple points off the high.
However, the big winner on our board today was Facebook, Inc. (FB), which jumped 1.50 to 20.93, on 121 million shares, not that far off the high at 21.16.
Some of the big percent movers included low-priced GTX Inc. (GTXI), up 73 cents to 4.52, or 19%. Coffee Holding Co.Inc. (JVA) gained 1.36 to 8.70, or 18 1/2%, on 4.6 million shares. Horizon Pharma, Inc. (HZNP) advanced 62 cents to 4.69, or 15%, on 1.2 million shares. EnerNOC, Inc. (ENOC) jumped 1.27 to 11.34, or 12.6%, on 1 million shares.
In addition, Millennial Media. Inc. (MM) was up 1.44 to 13.68, Digital Generation, Inc. (DGIT) up 1.19 to 12.19, Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (INFI) 1.64 to 20.72, Sears Holdings Corporation (SHLD) 4.34 to 60.90, ServiceNow, Inc. (NOW) 2.04 to 35.05, Terex Corp. (TEX) 1.31 to 24.28, United Natural Foods, Inc. (UNFI) 2.88 to 58.12, Texas Industries Inc. (TXI) 2.14 to 43.76, USG Corporation (USG) 1.11 to 23.52, and NetSuite Inc. (N) 2.75 to 60.24.
Youku Inc. (YOKU) was up 94 cents to 18.79, and Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (INFI) gained 1.64 to 20.72.
ProShares Ultra Long DJ-UBS Natural Gas (BOIL) continues strong, up 2.26 to 47.35.
Monster Worldwide, Inc. (MWW) gained 84 cents to 8.75, Velti Plc (VELT) 14 cents to 8.33, Heckmann Corporation (HEK) 37 cents to 4.50, and Sunesis Pharmaceuticals Inc. (SNSS) 31 cents to 3.80, were among some of the gainers on our board today.
On the downside, Google (GOOG) dropped 1.31 to 690.88, and ProShares Ultra VIX Short-Term Futures ETF (UVXY) was down 2.16 to 35.90.
Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices were quite volatile today, up at the opening, down in the morning, back up midday, and back down in the afternoon to new session lows, only to bounce back and close positive on the session.
It was a mixed consolidation day that saw a test of 2775, which was successful on the NDX.
Good Trading!
Harry