A mixed bag to finish off the week as the Dow fell 179 points on heavy volume. The advance/declines were slightly positive. The summation index continues sideways. Once again the overall market did better than the Dow with the NASDAQ ending the day positive. As long as the small stocks continue to show leadership to the upside, you cannot get too bearish on the market. The S&P 500 remains short term overbought. There's no overhead resistance for stocks and there's still plenty of liquidity to go around. The song remains the same. GE was up a few cents and the volume was light. Gold dropped $15 on the February futures but did finish up from the worst levels of the session. The US dollar was slightly higher. The XAU fell about a point, while GDX lost 1/2. Volume was average. The gold shares had a gap lower early and made back up a lot of ground during the session. It was positive price action in my mind considering the loss in gold. I didn't place an overnight option order this time around but perhaps I should have. I am looking at the GDX February calls for the next trade. GDX continues to hold on to its support at the 50 week moving average on a longer term chart. If that breaks I would not consider trading the calls. There is a potential head and shoulders top on the longer term chart that cannot be ignored. For now it remains just a potential outcome. GDX is still short term oversold. Mentally I'm feeling OK. The VIX was up a bit today and remains oversold. It's still below the 50 day moving average and that's a plus for the bulls. One week left in January and it's been a pretty positive month so far. We did have a quick drop during the last ten minutes today in the S&P. We'll see if that means anything when things get started again on Monday. Europe and Asia were lower to close the week. I'll be going over the charts this weekend as usual. It's Friday afternoon and time for a rest.