We had a one day reversal to the upside as stocks opened lower and closed higher. The Dow gained 146 points on average volume. The advance/declines were better than 2 to 1 negative. The summation index is moving down. Finally at least some kind of bounce in the market that was long overdue. Possibly just some short covering but the indicators were extended to the oversold side and some kind of relief was necessary. Perhaps we'll see some follow through after the jobs report on Friday. But the fundamental backdrop of higher rates for a longer time remains. The 3900 support level for the S&P 500 has held up for now. As long as the summation index is heading lower, the overall trend remains down. Gold dropped twenty bucks on the futures. Getting close to the $1700 level here. The US dollar was higher along with interest rates. The XAU lost 3 1/3, while GDX sank another 3/4. Volume was good to the downside again. The gold shares are blown out to the downside any way you look at it. I have placed an order for the GDX October calls and I'm leaving it out there. It will take some more decline in GDX to get filled. The October option cycle has an extra week in it. Mentally I'm feeling a bit tired. The VIX was lower today and remains short term overbought. On the daily chart it looks as though the VIX has put in a short term top. This would imply that we will see some near term strength in the stock market. Perhaps that will set us up for the SPY puts before the September expiration. However the potential S&P 500 inverse head and shoulders pattern remains intact. For now we'll wait and see what the reaction is to the employment report. Europe and Asia were both lower overnight. We'll close out the trading week tomorrow.