In spite of stellar earnings reports, AAPL and GOOG have been trading off for the last couple of days. NASDAQ has lost ground for three days in succession. The S&P 500 (SPX) gained $3 to close at $1283 while RUT continued its losing streak to close at $773, down $5. In 2010, RUT outperformed SPX very consistently - not so this year. Trading volume was mixed; trading in the S&P 500 was flat at 4 billion shares; trading was up 5% on the NYSE but down 17% on NASDAQ. The market action on SPX has been interesting the past two days. Yesterday's price action revealed the classic hammer candlestick; the hammer often signifies the reversal of a downward trend since the market trades down, but finds buyers and trades back up, leaving the long lower shadow of the candlestick. Today's shooting star candlestick is essentially the opposite signal: the market trades up, but sellers take it back down to close near its open. That often signifies the reversal of an upward trend. Having these two signals back to back tells me this market is in stalemate between the bulls and the bears; neither group seems to be able to move decisively and make it stick. But that also means we may be subject to a big move one way or the other if pushed by the right piece of news or economic data. I had begun to establish some of my Feb spreads this week, but chose hold off on placing any additional directional trades today. I will give this market another day or two to settle down.

SPX settled at $1289.25 so my Jan SPX 1210/1220 put spreads expired worthless. This confirms the net loss of 5% for the Jan SPX iron condor. The Feb iron condor on RUT stands at a P/L of +$2,000 with position delta = +$20 and position theta = +$67 (on 20 contracts). For those of you with Jan condors on RUT, the settlement price = $782.92.

Have a nice weekend.