Calm Before the Volatility (Market) Storm?

This afternoon I called up chart after chart of small and mid-cap technology and telecom stocks trading on NASDAQ to see if I could see any commonality in their technical behaviour. There appears to be a sameness among them, though I would only call this sample anecdotal, not a true analysis of the stocks in these sectors.

A surprising number of them are in volatility squeezes (narrowing of Bollinger Bands), sitting on top of their 50 DMA lines, or otherwise trading very placidly on low volume and low price volatility. Some of this low volatility is due to low volumes across the markets in the lead up to Labour Day although, so far, not much has changed this week. This leads me to suspect that the market, or at least the technology sector, is likely to see the start of a strong trending move, up or down, in the next week or so. My gut feel is that it'll be up.

Commodities on the other hand look like they're in for a longer period of slumping prices. It isn't only that energy, gold and the rest dived after Gustav missed hitting any critical infrastructure, it's that they dived below the price levels before the threat from Gustav was priced into the market. Next week should be a good time to fill up the tank.