The disappointing Chicago PMI numbers gave traders pause this morning, but it didn't take long for the bulls to take charge once again, driving the market higher in the afternoon. SPX opened lower and traded down to $1586 before recovering and trending higher to close up $4 at $1598. RUT gained $5 to close at $947. RUT still has a ways to go to beat its highs from March, but SPX set new historic highs today (it may have traded this high intraday in April, but this is a higher close). I was surprised by the market's strength today; I expected the markets to basically trade sideways as we move through the FOMC announcement and Bernanke's news conference tomorrow and then the jobs report on Friday. But these bulls are relentless.

The Chicago PMI came in at 49.0 for April, a big drop from last month's 52.4. But a positive note came from the Case Schiller Housing Price Index, up 9.3% in February after a strong +8.1% increase in January. In some areas, builders are resorting to lotteries to sell a limited number of housing to large numbers of hopeful buyers. This is some of the market action that is driving prices higher. My son sold his house in Plainfield, IL for the asking price in 5 hours yesterday!

I'm not a big fan of historical stock market statistics like the market being up or down in presidential election years and so on. But today marks the well known "Sell in May and go away" adage. Technically, the data suggest that selling on the last day in April and buying back into the market on Halloween, 10/31 would be a high probability strategy.

My May iron condor on RUT stands at a P/L of +$1,540 or +9% with position delta = +$8 and position theta = +$45. I bought some SPX puts for protection in my stock portfolio yesterday, but it doesn't seem like I need them... but I will feel better after the jobs report.