For those investors who thought there might be a quick V-bottom recovery in the markets like we saw last October, they have been sorely disappointed. Last week, the Dow Industrials fell -3.2%, the S&P 500 large caps fell -3.4%, the Nasdaq was down -3.0%, and the Russell 2000 small caps dropped -2.3%.From a technical standpoint, most chartists agree that much damage has been done to the charts and the market seems quite vulnerable and likely to retest lows. Market breadth is poor. And from a fundamental standpoint, the list of concerns is long.

For most of 2013 thus far, the market has been on a steady rise without volatility within a narrow channel. Bulls have been looking to recruit reinforcements for their assault on the all-time highs on the S&P 500 large caps and Dow Jones blue chips, after already taking out the all-time highs on the Russell 2000 small caps and S&P 400 mid caps.