Turkey fears again today as the Dow lost 137 points on good volume.  The advance/declines were 2 to 1 negative.  The overall market was weaker than the Dow.  Make no mistake that we're heading lower and that rallies can be shorted.  We did finish up from the worst levels of the day but there should be no doubt which way the market is headed.  The VIX jumped above 16 today before falling back to its 200 day moving average.  I guess that I can still hope for a bounce at some point but we all know hope is not a trading strategy.  It appears that I've missed the chance for the SPY September puts here.  The media has yet to jump on the downside bandwagon.  That alone tells me that there's more to come.  GE was off another 1/8 on average volume.  Gold got sold off again, the futures lost almost twenty bucks.  The US dollar had a slight gain.  The XAU fell 4 2/3, while GDX dropped 1 1/8.  Volume was extremely heavy.  It's a bloodbath for the gold shares.  These issues are so oversold that you can expect a pretty good snap back rally soon.  It won't amount to a change in trend but it may give me a chance to exit my GDX September call trade without a complete loss.  The seasonality for gold didn't show up this year, in fact it was the exact opposite.  Mentally I'm feeling OK.  So where do we go from here.  Sooner or later, down.  The gold sell off could be the result of margin calls around the world in addition to the rise in the US dollar.  I do not see the upward trend in the dollar turning around anytime soon.  The safe haven factor there along with rising rates in the US make the dollar the place to be for now.  A rising dollar is not good for US multinational companies, which would keep a lid on the stock market.  Throw in the trade tariff factor and the fundamentals right now are not bullish for stocks.  If these factors start to affect earnings, then you can see where all this is going.  Technically the short term indicators have rolled over and are not all the way oversold yet.  So I will simply have to wait to see if we get some kind of bounce to position myself in the September option period.  But as I've said, it may already be too late.  Europe and Asia were lower overnight.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.