The markets rocketed higher to start the holiday shortened week while the media was focused on the Dow 30 breaking above 26,000 for the first time. The Dow 30 was higher by over 200 points to start the day but investors may have assumed the move was too far too fast and sold into the rally. More negative talk out of the White House about shutting down the government probably didn't help either. Congress is looking to pass two bills at this point. Democrats want immigration reform before they give on the spending bill, and Trump wants the wall. Two weeks ago talks were going well, but recently have been more dramatic. The spending bill has until Friday night to avoid a government shutdown.

The Dow 30 closed the day down 6, the S&P 500 lost 9, and the Nasdaq 100 was lower by 37. All started the day much higher.

Volatility (VXX  ) was a big focus today having one of it's best days in months. Despite the markets being higher day in and day out, today's move seemed to change sentiment in the short term bull. With many calling for market pullbacks, today's selloff from the highs was enough to cause some to add a hedge.

One name that did not participate in today's rally was General Electric (GE  ). It seems that the company CEO is looking for ways to get the company back on track and is seriously considering a breakup. CNBC reported that their sources told them that the CEO could consider this as early as spring. GE is no stranger to divesting assets into separately traded companies. They did this quite successfully with Baker Hughes (BHI  ) though it has yet to really translate to a profitable event. GE has not had a good run recently. The stock is down over 40% in the last year, while the S&P 500 has added 23%.

Other names that made headlines today were Under Armour (UA  ) which lost 11.78% thanks to another downgrade. The analyst fears that they will need to raise more money, and their growth will not sustain that.

Merck (MRK  ) was the top gainer in the S&P 500 today, adding 5.81% after trial results showed that their drug, Keytruda actually extends lung cancer survival when used with two other chemotherapy drugs. Th drop from late October was from when they withdrew their European marketing application when regulators asked for more data. Merck is now seen as the market leader for this type of application.