A pause in the upside today as the Dow fell 42 points on average volume. The advance/declines were around 2 to 1 negative. The summation index is trying to turn around to the upside and I suspect that it will be successful. Digesting the huge gains of the first two days of the week is what I think we have going on here. We opened with a gap lower but unlike recent market action todays decline was met with buyers that eventually took the market higher before dropping back down near the close. The short term indicators for the S&P are still moving up and have room to go higher. It feels like some type of bottom has been put in. The question remains whether or not this is the end of the decline that started in the beginning of the year. Tomorrow should be a waiting for the jobs report kind of day. Gold dropped $5 on the futures. The US dollar was higher along with interest rates. The XAU fell around 1 1/2, while GDX shed 1/3. Volume was better than average. GDX is now hanging around its 50 day moving average. My GDX October calls lost some ground and it's possible that yesterday was the day to sell them. I'm hanging on to them for now though it may not be the proper strategy. Mentally I'm feeling OK. The VIX was a bit lower today which doesn't fit with a down market. The short term indicators are moving down but look like they're beginning to stall. Not sure what to expect next here but Friday should tell the story. Fundamentally nothing has changed for the stock market. However the technical measurements got so out of whack to the downside that some kind of upwards movement was long overdue. We got that upside the first two days of this week. The question is just how long it will last. It seems like buyers are willing to step in now where before they dissappeared. We'll just have to wait and see where we go from here. Asia higher and Europe lower in last nights trade. We'll keep an eye on tonights headlines.