Following good news from Intel and Dell, the market opened strongly but was hit with quick profit-taking. This was a bit of a change in character as this market has tended to react favorable to all news, good or bad. Finally around midday the dip-buyers showed up but they weren't overly energetic and only managed to recover about half of the pullback from the morning high.
The DJIA and S&P 500 lagged while the Nasdaq outperformed due to strength in semiconductors and technology stocks. Breadth was negative overall but not markedly so. It looked like lazy late summer action but under the surface there was some very aggressive trading in financials, particularly in the insurance sector. A lot of these have questionable fundamentals but market players didn't much care as the action was a good place to roll the dice for some quick gains.
The bears will be pointing at the lukewarm reaction to good news and the crazy speculative trading as a sign of a market top but the dip-buyers are still out there and haven't shown signs that they are going to disappear. They weren't too aggressive today but they let their presence be felt yet again.
Some folks think that they need to cheerlead this market, but one of the major positives is that there are quite a few skeptics. If everyone is in agreement about how wonderful things are then we'd really have to be nervous.
Like many others I'd really like to see this market pull back more (but not necessarily the stuff I own!), but I'm not seeing anything really dire yet. I think there is downside to come but it just isn't going to come as quickly or as easily as the bears would like. I suspect the bulls are going to remain quite stubborn for a while.
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