Following the lead from Europe's major indexes trading up today, our major market indexes traded higher as well, but trading volume dropped again. SPX closed up $21 at $1225 and RUT gained $14 to close at $712.  Trading in the S&P 500 dropped off to 2.8 billion shares; trading volume on the NYSE dropped 9% and trading on NASDAQ was essentially flat with a 1% drop. Retail sales gained 1.1% in September, but the University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey dropped to 57.5 for Oct, down from 59.4. SPX broke through the $1200 and $1220 resistance levels today. Some may set the upper resistance level of this trading channel at $1230 since SPX reached $1230 on an intraday basis in early September but then closed lower. In either case, we are close to breaking out of this trading range we have been trapped in for the past two months. The contrary indicator is the low levels of trading volume. Break-outs have a much higher probability of follow through when they occur on increased trading volume.

I left my Oct iron condor on RUT open. The 740/750 call spreads are about one standard deviation OTM; I will allow additional time to bleed out of this spread before closing it next week. This position stands at a P/L of -$1304 with delta = -$140 and theta = +$505. I rolled the 490/500 puts (closed for $0.28) in my November position up to 560/570 today (opened for $0.68). The Nov condor now stands at break-even with delta = -$57 and theta = +$127. This move has pushed our maximum gain up to $4,100 for this 20 contract position.

Enjoy the weekend.