The markets traded flat to modestly higher through most of the day, but then surrendered all of the gains and then some during the last hour of trading. A weaker dollar didn't appear to help the markets today. The ADP private payroll report showed a loss of 23k jobs in March; even though this was the smallest loss in some time, many traders were expecting to see some positive growth in jobs. And it fueled speculation about the government's jobs report Friday. Many are predicting those numbers to show some uptick due to the hiring of census workers, but today's ADP report is causing some traders to be pessimistic about the private sector's job growth. The Chicago PMI dropped to 58.8 in March from 62.6 in February, so that didn't help the mood. RUT traded as high as $688 in today's session, but then fell to $679 at the close, for a loss of almost $5 on the day. The SPX traded in a narrow range, closing down $4 to $1169. RUT and SPX have been trading in a very narrow range over the past seven sessions. Whenever the bulls have pushed prices higher, the bears have pulled them back, but the bears have also been unsuccessful in holding lower prices. Trading volume was surprisingly low, given the expected surge in end of the quarter trading. Trading on the NYSE was up 5% but down 1% on the NASDAQ. Trading volume for the S&P 500 rose from yesterday but remains below the 50 day moving average.

Today's move down on RUT pushed my April iron condor to a nearly perfectly delta neutral position, which is good since this trade is limping along at this point from the damage done earlier in March. The P/L stands at -$1,445, delta = -$3 and theta = +$159; the May position stands at +$440, delta = -$15 and theta = +$69.