Stocks opened today strongly, and the rally never faltered, with SPX closing at $2069, up $22 and near its high for the day. RUT ran up $7 to close at $1203.  Volatility contracted a bit with the VIX closing at 17.2%, down 1.4 points. Trading volume was up modestly with 2.2 billion shares of the S&P 500 stocks trading today, but this is just at the 50 dma. Trading was up 1% on the NYSE and was up 8% on NASDAQ.

The markets have been caught in a sideways consolidation trading range since the markets rallied out of the October correction and hit highs around the beginning of December. But this has been a choppy, volatile trading range. SPX rallied to highs around $2064 on January 9th and then again on January 22nd. SPX closed right at that level last Thursday, but couldn't hold it, dropping Friday and Monday. The bulls took charge and drove into that area again today, closing at $2069. Can they hold it this time? The levels to watch on the top side of this consolidation range are $2075, the high from December 5th and $2091, the high from December 29th. Breaking through those levels will confirm the bulls' command of the market.

The only significant economic data released today was the JOLTS job openings for December at 5.028 million, up from November's 4.847 million. Some news outlets attributed today's bullish market to positive hopes for Greece to renegotiate their debt. I'm not sure where that hope is based. All the news I see has the Euro Zone holding firm to the previous agreements. But even the so-called worst case of Greece leaving the Euro Zone isn't a danger to the Euro Zone or our markets. A consolidation range of trading following such strong advances in 2013 and 2014 shouldn't be too surprising. The difference from previous markets is the extreme price volatility. At least part of the root cause for the volatility is the unprecedented Fed QE; we are in uncharted economic territory and traders are hitting the sell button at the least sign of trouble - and Greece qualifies.