Traders became more bullish today on news that Boehner was meeting with Obama and had offered to raise taxes on those making more than one million dollars per year. In my opinion, the notable news was the absence of any concessions from Obama. If we trust his press secretary, it appears the President is not yet in negotiation mode. So traders may take this market back down tomorrow; who knows? It is a rough market to be trading.

SPX ran up $17 to close at $1430 and RUT tacked on $11 to close at $835. Trading volume moved up modestly with 2.5 billion shares of the S&P 500 stocks trading; this is an increase from Friday, but remains below the 50 dma. Trading volume increased 8% on the NYSE and volume increased 6% on NASDAQ.

The only economic news (hard data as opposed to fiscal cliff watching) was the Empire Manufacturing Survey; it came in at -8.1 for December, a little worse than the previous -5.2. That isn't the right direction!

My Dec iron condor stands at a P/L of -$2,600 with delta = -$174 and theta = +$643. Today's move up pushed it further in the hole, but the theta decay is getting huge so each day makes a big difference. So we wait until tomorrow to tune back into the Fiscal Cliff soap opera. I have a prediction: a deal will be struck; it will include real tax increases but nebulous promises about cutting spending in the future.