Breakdown

I've been detailing the bearish technical conditions in the market for the past few weeks now, and with Friday's strong close down, which qualified as a bearish price reversal (a close below .8 standard deviation from the 10 day moving average) in all the major indexes, I believe the correction I've been anticipating is now occurring. Judging by the extremes in sentiment and the long running divergences in breadth, the correction could be very significant.

In my last post I noted the Dow Non-Confirmation as well as the other riskier indexes breaking down ahead of the Dow Industrial average. Despite the strong move up Wednesday and Thursday, none of the secondary indexes managed confirm the Dow's high, in fact Friday the Transportation and the Nasdaq indexes managed to break the last swing low, with the Russell following close behind.

Chart 1: Dow Theory

So for now, with the sentiment extremes, the momentum extremes, the divergences in breath, and now mechanical signals telling us to sell the market, a very negative view is appropriate until at least some of these signals reverse.