I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

We have become accustomed to the markets rising every day, so what's going on? SPX clipped off $14, closing at $2053 while RUT traded even more weakly, gapping open lower and closing at $1154, losing $19 on the day. One would expect trading volume to pick up from the holiday-shortened session Friday, but trading in the S&P 500 stocks actually bumped up to 2.3 billion shares, popping up over the 50 day moving average, at 2.2 billion shares. Trading volume rose 19% on the NYSE and rose 78% on NASDAQ. The VIX gapped open higher this morning and closed one full percentage point higher at 14.3%.

The ISM manufacturing index reported today at 58.7 for November, a drop from October's 59.0. Today's market weakness appeared to be primarily driven by the weak retail sales over the Thanksgiving holiday, coming in 11% lower than last year. There were also weaker economic reports from China and Europe, raising the specter of a global economic slowdown. the Fed's Beige book comes out Wednesday, amid reports that the FOMC members are worried about deflation; if that is explicitly addressed in the minutes, we could see additional market weakness. Of course, this week's economic news builds up to the jobs report Friday.