Both yesterday and today, the market opened higher, but couldn't hold it. The market danced around the unchanged mark much of this afternoon, but traded off strongly in the last thirty minutes of trading. SPX dropped $17 to close at $1973, but RUT stayed in positive territory almost all day, closing down one dollar at $1139. The VIX was up about a point most of the day, but spiked toward the end of trading, closing at 23.6%, up over three points. Trading volume spiked up with 2.7 billion shares of the S&P 500 stocks trading. Trading volume rose 11% on the NYSE and was up 6% on NASDAQ.

I still don't get the panic surrounding lower oil prices. This is putting a lot of extra money in the pockets of consumers. I was working for a major oil company in the nineties when oil dipped below $10 a barrel; it was good for everyone except the oil companies. In fact, I was in the chemical subsidiary and we posted better numbers because of having cheaper feedstock.

In any case, the market is showing some signs of slowing its plunge. Tomorrow's FOMC announcement could push the market over the edge in this market environment. At times like these, traders tend to read too much into these announcements. Or maybe the Fed will give us some assurance. Maybe.