The market traded in positive territory most of the day but sold off in the last two hours. It appears to be a classic case of bouncing off of resistance, i.e., the highs for the year set a few weeks ago. RUT closed at $614 while SPX edged out a small gain to hold $1076. The high for the year in SPX was $1080 and today's intraday high before the sell-off was $1079. So the market will be looking for news or economic data of sufficient strength to push it through those levels. We are in the midst of earnings reports, so one or more of those may spark some enthusiasm, but I doubt it. The FOMC minutes will be released Wednesday and may spark a move. We may just wander sideways for a while.

My Oct condor is still within my two standard deviation rule, so I am continuing to hold those positions; the P/L stands at $460, delta = +$3 and theta = +$224. My Nov condor is also in a good position with P/L = +960, delta = -$26 and theta = +$96.

If you are thinking of entering a RUT Nov iron condor now with 38 days to expiration, I would consider the 680/690 call spreads and the 520/530 put spreads. Both of these positions are well outside of one standard deviation and the deltas of the short strikes are about 9-10. But I would try to get a minimum of $0.70; failing that, I would look at the next set of strikes closer in at 530/540 and 670/680; here the short strike deltas are about 12-13 and you are still outside of  the one standard deviation marks at $561 and $667. But remember to set your contingency stop loss orders. Be disciplined.