The Dow got clobbered today as it fell 473 points on heavy volume. The advance/declines were 3 to 1 negative. The summation index is starting to head lower. The Dow was the weakest of the major indices. No real news to use as an excuse for the decline. The market is simply feeling heavy. The negative divergences that we saw are for real and expect lower prices going forward. That doesn't mean that we won't have some buying coming in. But it does mean use those times to look at the short side. i did place an overnight order for some SPY May puts but it wasn't close to getting filled. I'm leaving it out there in hopes we get some kind of snapback rally before heading lower again. There's only 8 days left in the May option cycle but if the decline is for real, it should last for over a week at least. GE was off 1/4 on average volume. Gold was up a buck or so after being sold off hard early on. The US dollar finished little changed as rated ticked up again. The XAU gained 2 3/8, while GDX added 1/4. Volume was light. The gold shares had a one day reversal to the upside as they opened much lower to begin the trading day. I also placed an overnight order for some GDX May calls that wasn't filled. I had two orders that I was thinking about and unfortunately chose the wrong one to put in. The other would have been filled and already show a nice profit as the gold shares are being bought at the moment. Overbought here to be sure but the market is in a peculiar spot right now. I've since canceled the GDX call trade and will probably focus on the SPY for now. Mentally I'm feeling OK. The VIX spiked up again and touched its 200 day moving average. It also closed above the important level of 20. This probably means that volatility has returned unless we see a rally from here to new all time highs. I think that the probability of that happening is low. My best guess is that we'll see the SPY decline to its 50 day moving average at around 403 between now and expiration Friday on the 21st. That's why I'm trying to get some SPY puts as the strategy right now. We've got inflation data due out the next two trading sessions. This should provide reasons or excuses for movement in the markets near term. Europe and Asia were both lower as we are seeing selling around the globe. The market always knows more than we do. We'll see how things go tomorrow.