Markets tried to add some small gains today, but were pulled back this afternoon to modest losses. SPX closed at $1301, down $4 while RUT closed down $1 at $799. RUT ran as high as $810 before being pulled back down. Trading volume on the S&P 500 dropped a bit from yesterday but remains above average at 3.3 billion shares.

Initial unemployment claims dropped to 398k, down from last week's 422k. Continuing claims dropped by 17 thousand but remain around 3.7 million. Pending home sales rose 2.4% in June, but this was down from last month.

My Aug condor consists only of 20 contracts of the 670/680 puts with delta = +$24 and theta = +$82; the delta of the 680 puts = 5. The Sept iron condor on RUT stands at a P/L of +$100 with delta = -$6 and theta = +$73. Since I don't expect much progress on the debt ceiling issue, I suspect we have more of this dismal sideways to downward action in front of us for a while.