Market Notes: Investors Cooling On Chile, Getting Sweet On Cocoa, Souring On Sugar

The major averages followed through on Friday's sell-off until the bulls stepped in mid-day causing the market to reverse. The rally was short-lived, alas, as the bears charged back going into the close. Although the VIX closed well off its intraday high of 19, it's still in bearish territory and it appears that there's a good chance the market will close the month of January in the red. But, hey, there's still a few days left... Emerging markets in particular have been under intense selling pressure. Argentina has been a favorite punching bag as of late but it got a rest today as investors decided to gang up on its neighbor, Chile. Sliding to new lows were Chilean banks BCH and BSAC, retailer CNCO, and electric utility company ENI. It'll be interesting to see who gets pummeled next...Bolivia? One of the few bright spots today was in soft commodities where my favorite "softie", the Cocoa ETF (NIB) , jumped 4% breaking out to a new two year high. On the flip side, the Sugar ETF (SGG) slid to a multi-year low. It broke $50 support today and appears that it is going a lot lower. Unless there's a fundamental reason to suggest otherwise, I would not be surprised if it tests its all-time low in the $37 area. A long NIB/short SGG pair trade would have been sweet and still it looks good--yum! 1:50 pm ET: Intraday support/resistance: SPX 1774/1897 DTX 713/729 DJIA 15785/15955 Nasdaq 4044/4136 RUT 1115/1147 VIX 17/19 Trin range: 0.75 - 1.4 Average VWAPs: +88/-59 (mildly bullish)