By Greg Peel

The Dow closed down 33 points or 0.3% while the S&P lost 0.4% to 1324 and the Nasdaq dropped 0.7%.

The Dow has now closed down eleven of the past twelve sessions, with uncertainty over Greece the familiar driver. Earlier sessions had the average dropping sharply from the open ahead of a grinding recovery to a lesser fall. More recent sessions have seen a similar fall on open, an attempted crawl back, but then a late day sell-off. Last night the Dow opened strongly, up 90 points, but drifted gradually lower all day. The buy-on-the-dip players are fighting a good fight, but not making any headway. One wonders when they will capitulate and simply stand aside.

Capitulation was certainly written all over the Australian market yesterday.

Driving Wall Street's strong open were some positive economic data. US housing starts rose 2.6% in April to an annual average of 717,000 and March starts were revised up from 654,000 to 699,000. The gloss wore off slightly, with a 7% fall in permits in April (permits precede starts), but March permits were revised up to 769,000 ? the highest level since 2008. These data follow on from Tuesday night's encouraging rise in the housing market sentiment index. [For more on US housing, see