I didn't know what the best title for this post would be but maybe someone can give some input. It's regarding what may cause a broader sell off or rise in the markets other than news or general trends, specifically sectors, and how to be on the lookout for it. For example when tech stocks rally or today when the health insurance sector slid the rest will often follow.There are so many issues to look at and I do not want to confuse myself, but it would be useful to be able to detect signs of what may be about to happen in the broader markets.Hope this makes sense.

What I do is have a watchlist of the sector indices, and I check them out usually daily, looking for patterns and setups, same as with anything. This can sometimes give a heads up for a specific sector when the broader indices don't say as much. But generally, though, I find it is uncommon for sectors that are positively correlated to the main indices to buck them. As I learned in the early days it goes market, sector, individual stock. Just a heads up that the correlation is high and when the sectors have patterns the broader indices also tend to.

That's useful information. Thanks Jim.