Amidst record-high levels of bearishness on Wall Street over the political crisis in Europe and the U.S., a funny thing is happening today: the market is slowly coming off its lows.
The Dow, once down over 300 points, was down only 114 points at 2:30pm ET. Some of those gains had been reversed in the following half hour.
Why are we off the lows? Some say it's because the Greek Finance Minister is promising to step up the privatization plans (a minor data point).
Regardless: there's definitely bids around, but don't get too excited: this is not unusual after a poor showing overseas, and after Europe has closed.
And no one is going after financials. Even with Bank of America off its lows, it's still down 3 percent on the day.
And coming off the lows hardly constitutes a meltup: "When you are down 2-3% and the market has bounced to down 1.8% I think its pretty irrelevant," one trader wrote to me.
Finally, don't kid yourself: the Street remains as bearish as ever.
The problem is September is littered with trading land mines: the austerity bill in Italy, the Greek bailout votes and EFSF that needs the approval of the euro zone members, the German court ruling on the constitutionality of the whole Greek bailout (due tomorrow), the Obama speech this Thursday, the two-day Federal Reserve meeting on September 20-21.
Faced with these X-factors, many traders think trading will be choppy — and potentially dangerous — until October rolls around.
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