Today the market rallied over nothing. Hence the title. The Fed, as by now you all know, kept interest rates exactly where they were before. The Dow rocked well over 300 points higher, and equities across the board zoomed upward while gold got pummeled again.

Prior to the opening, I had an interesting experience. One of the readers here – – I won't name him, but he's a good guy, and I respect him – – mentioned I was sounding "arrogant". Now my first reaction was to dismiss him as simply wrong, but I quickly told myself – – that's what an arrogant person would do! So I took my emotional temperature and told myself to listen to what he was saying. If a thoughtful, regular reader jabs me like that, I probably need to take stock of where my head is at and make some adjustments.

Now I'm not talking about adjusting my writing. In all honesty, it's not like I was being a blowhard. But there was enough "attitude" that he made a remark, and I decided that was a good signal – – much better than any technical indicator! – – that I'd better embrace humility, take a lot of positions off the table, and center myself. So that's what I did.

It may seem bizarre to have one word from one man (whom I've never even met) compel me to close out six figures worth of positions, but one of the cool things about doing this blog is that it gives me a mirror. And when that mirror starts to look ugly, I know that I need to adjust things. (Conversely, when I'm losing money, and I'm beating myself up, the pats on the back and "things will be ok!" reach a fevered pitch just before things turn around for the better).

Not to say that I didn't lose money today. I gave back a portion of yesterday's terrific 15% rise. But I definitely preserved a lot of profits that would have otherwise been lost.

With the big push higher in equities, we must ask ourselves again if we're going to march all the way up to 1320 on the S&P. But keep in mind it would only take one more day like today to get us all the way there! It's only 2.7% higher from here.

The Dow's next reasonable resistance is at 11,700. If it breaks that, I'd say it's heading to just below 12,000.

I have some Russell puts, and they're down about 20%. I'm on the fence whether I'll hold on tight or just dump 'em and wait for a better buying spot.

The resistance for S&P is as plain as day. Stop #1 is about 1292. Stop #2 is 1320. Simple as that.

The chart of crude oil below looks pretty bearish, but you'll be surprised to hear how bullish I am on energy in a minute. As I've been saying, though, crude could head toward $110 or so before turning higher.

$UTIL, you old beauty! Even though it went up today, this is a great pattern. As with ICE, I've drawn two necklines, since I'm not sure which is the real one. It's busted them both, however.

Now, on to energy. I've made a lot of cash being an energy bear. I think I'm changing costumes tonight. Off comes the furry head, and on comes the one with horns on top. I think there are a lot of exciting technical opportunities on the bullish side of energy and commodities. Just look at XEC. That horizontal line is pretty exciting looking, if it holds. (Yes, I just described a horizontal line as exciting; pity me).

The energy plays fall into two camps. One is the [exciting] horizontal lines. The other is retracement to major trendlines. DO is an example of the latter.

GDP has an XEC-style situation.

One thing that I think will help push energy higher is that I think gold is due for a bounce. Poor old gold! This thing has gotten just creamed!

Excitement is ubiquitous.

POT got smoked, and put holders prospered. Now I think we could be in for a 20-30 point bounce higher. Long-term, I think this is going to be a bear's delight, but why not play it both ways?

I also tripped across this little beauty today, and I bought some.

Setting aside my bullishness on energy for a moment, CEG is a pretty interesting looking toppy pattern.

And I think I'll sell my puts on MOS first thing in the morning. We've touched the retracement, and I'd like to re-enter if the price gets back to the next Fib up, which is at about $126.

I bought more PCLN puts today, and I'm glad I did. This thing is down $17 after hours tonight!

Ah, and good old BAC. This is what we technicians call the Farting Around Pattern. What on earth is this thing doing? When it breaks, it's going to break big (either up or down).

I am so behind on my emails, I really need to attack those. Thanks again for visiting Slope of Hope, and be sure to come back tomorrow! XOXOXOXO.

As we await the Fed's announcement at 2:15 EST, I thought I'd put up a 'comment cleaner' chart – – the Russell 2000. Of all the indexes, this is probably the one I feel most comfortable trading right now. I've done a couple of annotations here (very simple), and I've showed the 726.27 stop price. Post-announcement movements tend to be hysterically volatile, but we'll see where all the dust finally settles. Good luck to you!

You've probably read Warren Buffett's famous two rules of investing.

1. Don't lose money
2. Never forget rule #1

Ha! Ha ha!

Now, I imagine you consider this advice in the same category that I do – – – a useless bromide, equivalent to telling a newly married couple not to get divorced or a startup business only to sell successful products.

But I am taking the Oracle of the Really Unfortunate Town to Inhabit to heart today, since I've had a great run, and I want to protect my hard-won profits. There is no worse feeling in the world than seeing a profit turn into a loss, so I have been:

• Closing out positions that I think have had their run for now
• Reducing the size of positions that might have more life in them but have become overly large due to built-in profits
• Tightening stops for the rest

The Fed announces today, and it is widely expected they will simply leave interest rates alone at 2%. As always, the "EKG" effect on intraday charts will be in full force. Hang on tight, and keep your eye on the big picture instead of the latest tick.

I liked today a lot. One, my portfolio went up substantially – – over 15%. Not bad for one day. And two (and this is the part I really like), it didn't take some nutty market collapse to make it happen. The Dow fell 0.37%. Nothing!

The reason for my positions surging was that my hypothesis, which I've been pretty vocal about, is panning out. That is – – energy: down; equities: down. Not inversely related. Again – – – energy (and commodities in general, while we're on the subject): down; equities: down.

Now, just like no "up" is straight up, no "down" is straight down. Looking at the continuous crude contract (how's that for alliteration?), I'd say we're probably in for a breather when oil gets to $112 a barrel or so. People were ga-ga bullish when oil was $140 a barrel. I can only imagine some futures n00bs got their scalps handed to them already.

The OIH has cut through its fan line, and – just eyeballing it – I'd say $170 or so is a good target. Not to say that oil and the OIH have much, much farther to fall. I'm just talking about the coming week or two.

I sure wish $XAU options were more liquid. I'd really enjoy that market if they were. But they're not, and I avoid it……….which is unfortunate, since it's a really dynamic, technically-interesting market. The $XAU has plummeted an incredible 25% in just a few days. Here again, commodities n00bs (on the long side, at least) surely were surprised. But fortunes were made on the short side.

I have a quantity of positions that ticks a lot of Garys off (80), and yes, it's cumbersome. I took a little money off the table today, but mostly I tightened my stops. Looking at the $CRX, it seems sensible to have a bit of a bounce here, but for goodness sake, I've seen so many graphs like this lately, and sometimes they don't wait for a bounce; they simply cut through the trendline and take no prisoners.

And, oh, yes, my good friend $UTIL. I walked into the palatial office of my network guys today, and I wrote "SDP" in huge letters on their whiteboard. There is no more "jumping the gun" here. This is a head and shoulders. It's complete. The neckline is cut. And this thing is ready to rock.

The Beijing Olympics (which had the inexplicable magical power to lift the Chinese stock market – – I still don't understand the logic behind that one) starts on Friday. Does this mean we can look forward to a serious plunge after the games are over? As if it hasn't plunged enough. I bought some FXP today (it's been quite a while……….).

My puts are strictly on the $RUT, and the position isn't that huge. I might even take it off the table thanks to almost assured Fed wackiness Tuesday at 2:15 EST. As for the $NDX, I'm keeping a close eye on this one to see if it marches toward the fanline above or snaps its ways down to the line below.

The Russell 2000 – – awww, should I even say it? – – OK, my apologies – – is in the formative stages of the mother of all patterns. There is huge debate about whether there's another push higher in the cards (S&P 1320) or if we've had that run already. Search me.

I've got a handful of ideas for you, some of them new. Here's Ace, Ltd.

CEG looks like another H&S.

I have no position in FNM, but this stock sure doesn't look done falling. Don't you think a disaster is going to happen here? Doesn't it seem like its fate is sealed, bailout or not? Just sayin'.

I sold my POT put for a huge profit today, but only because it was an August put (my only one left) and I get very jumpy owning options in the same calendar month as they expire. If this strengthens back to 200 or so, I'll jump right in again.

SGMS burned me just a little recently, but I'm still watching this pattern with great interest.

The energy sector is stuffed with issues that have broken huge trendlines. I like RIG.

Finally, here's another clip from Don Harrold. I feel a kinship with Don since (a) he gets really ticked off at B.S. (b) he gets paid $0.00 to reveal it to the world. Go, Don, go!