The Black Box

[michalel97123]

2:30 pm : In a striking turn of events, the major indices have sold off hard in the past half hour, with each revisiting negative territory.

There wasn't any specific piece of news to account for the reversal that has been broad-based. The tech sector (-0.6%) is spearheading the retreat, although the retailers and consumer discretionary sector (-0.3%) are also playing an active role.

Frankly, the strength in the retail index earlier was questionable in light of the lackluster same-store sales reports for September and the fact that Wal-Mart's (WMT) positive earnings surprise was really a company-specific situation.

That the indices would run into profit taking shouldn't be a complete surprise. After all, they have made a remarkable (and unsustainable run) off their lows since August 16. To this point, at their highs today, the Nasdaq, Russell 2000, S&P 500 and Dow, were up 17%, 16%, 15% and 13% from their August 16 lows.DJ30 -28.94 NASDAQ -27.81 SP500 -5.03 NASDAQ Dec/Adv/Vol 1518/1305/1.70 bln NYSE Dec/Adv/Vol 1401/1851/819 mln