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Category: Dr. Duke's Blog
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I am running out of superlatives to describe recent market action. It seems like traders are being jerked back and forth nearly every day. It reminds me of Greek mythology where the Gods toy with the humans - the market Gods are having fun with us. No significant economic news came out today to justify this huge run. In fact, the talking heads on CNBC were having a hard time explaining the move today. Perhaps the absence of bad news was sufficient motivation for traders. Trading volume was light today with a 1% decline on the NYSE and a 3% rise on the NASDAQ. The S&P 500 stocks traded 4 billion shares, flat with yesterday and well below the 50 day moving average.

SPX closed at $1060, up $32, while RUT ran $22 to close at $612. Big moves on light volume shouldn't be trusted so beware of tomorrow's market; don't just blindly start going long. It would not be surprising to see some of today's gains given back. I will be watching to see if SPX can close above the critical $1042 resistance level that was broken today. Closing above $1042 for a couple of sessions will offer some reassurance that a bottom has been reached.

I rolled the 730/740 call spreads of my RUT Aug iron condor down to 680/690 this morning. The put spreads are split between 510/520 and 550/560. At the close today, this position is well positioned with a position delta = -$14 and position theta = +$93.