The market started the new week in a volatile fashion. In the end, all three major indices finished the session modestly higher with the Dow adding 48 points on top of last week’s 400+ point gain. The Nasdaq, extending its winning streak to five straight sessions, was the best performer among the big three and advanced more than 1%. There is little corporate or economic news. However, the US dollar continued to grab most attention as it closed above 76, the highest level since February. The strength in the dollar helped to lower crude price, which also helped market sentiment.

Basic materials, energies and transportations were among the biggest losers for the session. It was quite rare to see the latter two appear together. It is possible that weakness in commodities might influence certain segments of transportation, essentially railways. On the winners’ list, we had names such as consumer cyclical and financial. As for the latter, it should be noted that the temporary short-selling curb on the sector will be lifted tomorrow and some extra volatility should be expected. The CRB commodity index continued to slide and gold price closed at the lowest level in 2008. In addition to weakness seen in most commodity prices, the BDI shipping index closed barely above the 7000 level today. In fact, last week was the first time in more than two years that the index was lower than the level one year before. Since peaking at around 11700 points two months ago, the index has dropped over 40% without gluts of new supplies. Apparently, the economy worldwide is slowing down quite significantly. Treasuries tumbled with yields moving sharply higher. The VIX index dropped two percent. The market breath was positive on both NYSE and Nasdaq with moderate volume.