Thursday’s Market Roundup

The overall market struggled to find direction most of the session before falling 1.21% to close at 1157, off 14.23 points. The S&P 500 SPY closed very near its lows of the session. The sell off seemed to come after traders realized that there was neither enough volume, nor conviction to push the market through the 50-week moving average at 1173. The CBOE Volatility Index VIX spiked higher toward the end of the day as well, after trading lower on session for most of the day. The VIX closed at 26.64, up 4.55% on the session. Traders were also taking some money out of commodities today with Gold futures GLD, Silver futures SLV, and Platinum PTM all down on the session. Notably, natural gas futures UNG popped today after a bullish inventory report. Notable movers today included: •Cisco Systems CSCO, which was lower by 4.60% today despite better than expented earnings •Alcoa AA, which was the leader in the DJIA DIA today, ending higher by 2.81% on no news •Sprint Nextel S, which gained 7.47% when it announced that it would sell pre-paid wireless at Wal-Mart WMT •NetFlix Inc. NFLX, which hit a fresh 52-week high on 5x normal volume