The jobs report coincided well with ADP's earlier report this week on private payrolls, citing a weak increase in new jobs and a slight decrease in the unemployment rate to 8.1%. But many analysts noted that the labor participation rate has hit historic lows, thus making the unemployment rate look better than it actually is. Investors reacted negatively and this was fueled by concerns about upcoming elections in Europe. Many traders chose to pare down their exposure. SPX dropped $22 to close at $1369 and RUT dropped $15 to close at $792. SPX solidly broke through support at $1390; the next major support level to watch is $1360. The analogous support level for RUT is $785. I suspect today's severe drop won't continue into next week, but we'll see.

Surprisingly, trading volume was only slightly up from the previous session, at 2.7 billion shares of the S&P 500. Trading on the NYSE dropped 3% on the NYSE and rose 4% on NASDAQ.

My iron condor on RUT for May now stands at a P/L of +$680 with delta = +$41 and theta = +$110. The June condor stands at a P/L of +$1140 with delta = +$2 and theta = +$60. The volatility spike today reduced our P/L temporarily, but they are both well positioned.

Have a great weekend.