Today's SPY action

Today didn't turn out the way I expected. After a rough day in many foreign markets, I expected the US markets to struggle more than they did.

I took a position right out the market open. Although the gap was not huge (less than a buck in SPY), I felt that there was enough negative momentum to push the market lower. The trade went my way after a brief move upward.

A pullback to the 20 EMA got me nervous and nearly stopped me out at break-even, but I held on expecting the market to go much lower. We got another swing low for the day that was followed by a stair-step retracement back to the 20 EMA. When that red candle busted past the lows of the day I started rubbing my hands together in anticipation of a large move down. But then the buyers came back in with a large (nearly engulfing) candle. That was my signal that "all was not right" and I got out.

Using the $TICK helped me avoid holding on too long today. We didn't make any -1,000 reading during the day indicating that the selling pressure just wasn't overwhelming.
The market made a new TICK high at 3pm indicating that new highs were coming. I have no idea what is driving the last hour of the market, but it seems to happen nearly every day. I am too much of a wimp to play it, and I've been burned by being on the wrong side, so I chose to close shop early today and avoided trading the afternoon insanity.