Another Real Bad Day For The Market?

There are bad days in the market and there are real bad days. So far, Tuesday's price action has the potential to be characterized as a real bad day. A year that begun the first week with a thud, is not faring much better in its second week. In Monday's session, the S&P 500 index futures opened sharply higher only to surrender all of those gains, make a new low for the recent slide. However, it did manage to battle back to post a modest gain. Today's price action is more damning. What was a 25 handle gain has dissipated as the index struggles to stay in the green. So why is the price action so troubling? Perhaps the "buy the dip" mentality has faded and "sell the rip" is the new mantra for the market in 2016. Also, Alcoa Inc.

has got the unofficial start of earnings season off on the wrong foot. Despite a slight EPS beat, its revenue miss of roughly 500 million, has the Street sending the issue towards it April 2009 low ($7.03) as it lower by $0.72 at $7.28, Lets certainly hope that is not a telltale sign for the entire market. For now, earnings reports later in the week will be more determinative of the next major move in the market. On Thursday, before the market opens, the Street will be digesting earnings from financial giants JP Morgan

. After the close, the Street will get earnings from old-time tech giant Intel

. On Friday before the open, the fate of the financial sector for the quarter could very well determined as several financial institution will be reporting Q4 earnings. The companies do to the report include Blackrock Inc.

, Citigroup

, Wells Fargo

and PNC Financial

. Keep in mind, the purported hike in interest rates, which is said to be beneficial sector will not be fully reflected in their Q4 reports. In view of the index's recent fall from grace (knocking on the door of all time highs in December), it is now much closer to its lows from the Flash Crash low in August. Based on the March 2016 contract that low comes in at 1814 or roughly 100 points from its current level. For technicians that were calling for a retest of that critical level, if this earnings season disappoints, they may very well see that scenario come to fruition.