Some buying for a change today as the Dow climbed 509 points on lighter volume. The advance/declines were positive. The summation index continues lower. The inflation data came in where expected and the market had a big gap higher at the open. The rest of the day was spent in a sideways pattern that limped home to the close. Now we have to figure out if this is the start of something to the upside or another bounce out of the blue that turns around and heads for lower lows. Once again the Dow, NASDAQ and S&P 500 had about the same percentage move on the session. The S&P closed back above the 7600 level and some of the short term indicators have turned back up. We've got the Fed to deal with next week and a rate hike is now expected. I would not be too sure of that. Gold dipped $14 on the futures. The US dollar was barely higher and interest rates ticked up. The XAU was up 2 1/3, while GDX gained a point. Volume was light. I did place an order overnight for the GDX September calls in case we got some selling today but that did not happen and I canceled the order. Some of the short term indicators for GDX are almost oversold. If rates do get raised in the US next week, owning the gold share calls is probably not the best idea. Mentally I'm feeling OK. The VIX dropped which fits the positive day for stocks. Most of its short term indicators have now turned back down from overbought territory. That could mean that the decline is over. However the breadth today wasn't all that great considering the move up that we had. I will have to go over everything this weekend and determine which trading idea to take next week. Either the SPY September puts or the GDX September calls with only a week to go in the option cycle. Risky indeed. However we should definitely see some market movement post Fed. I would like to be positioned in something before that event. Or perhaps I'll remain on the sidelines. We'll see. Europe higher and Asia lower to close the week. It's Friday afternoon and time for a break.