Back and forth to close out the trading week as the Dow gained 139 points on average volume. The advance/declines wwere positive. The summation index is moving higher. The jobs report came in where expected with buyers and sellers taking turns with the price action. The Dow was the leader to the upside. The S&P 500 remains short term overbought but perhaps a temporary bottom is in place on the daily charts. The TRAN got clobbered today and that may be something to keep an eye on. The NASDAQ remains below its 200 day moving average. Gold fell $25 on the futures. The US dollar was slightly higher along with interest rates. The gold shares rallied with the XAU up 4 3/4, while GDX added 1 1/8. Volume is still light here but you cannot argue with price. Gold down and the gold shares up is bullish. Short term overbought for the gold shares. Any selling here though is immediately met with buyers. Is there still a chance to try the GDX April calls with less than 2 weeks to go in the April option cycle? Perhaps but being overbought presents some risk to be sure. Also if a cease-fire were to occur in the Russia/Ukraine conflict there would most likely be a rush to the exits. I'll consider the possibilities over the weekend. Mentally I'm feeling OK. The VIX was lower today and is back below 20. Still short term oversold and the up trend line from November remains intact for now. Not sure where the VIX is headed from here and I'm not about to guess. I'll go over the charts this weekend and try to come up with some sort of game plan for next week. My thinking is that the market will move up from here in the short term but who knows? Some economic data due out next week but nothing on inflation. Asia was mixed and Europe slightly higher to end the week. It's Friday afternoon and time for a break.