The S&P 500 Index (SPX) set a new all-time high today, closing at $1992, up $6. Yesterday's close fell a little short of the closing high on July 24th at $1988. RUT continues to trade much weaker than SPX or the NASDAQ composite, closing today at $1160, up $3. RUT closed above its 50 dma but almost touched the 200 dma intraday. By contrast, NASDAQ has set three all-time highs this week and SPX set a new all-time high today. Trading volume remains below average and was flat to mixed today with 1.6 billion shares of the S&P 500 stocks trading, up from yesterday's 1.5B, but well below the 50 dma at 1.9B. Trading volume was up 2% on the NYSE and down 6% on NASDAQ.

Initial unemployment claims dropped to 298k today, from last week's 312k. Continuing unemployment claims dropped to 2.5 million. Existing home sales increased to an annualized rate of 5.15 million for July, up from last month's 5.03M. The Philadelphia Fed survey increased to 28.0 for August from last month's 23.9.

I closed the 2040/2050 call spreads of my September SPX iron condor today. I will look for an opportunity to sell new Sep call spreads if the market pulls back; otherwise, I will allow the 1830/1840 put spreads to expire worthless for a 15% gain for September.

I am thinking the markets may pull back a bit or at least pause when SPX crosses the big $2000 mark. But who knows? Nothing has stopped this bull yet. Valuation arguments are the current debate.