as i mentioned, the volatility, the v.i.x., closes at the highest level in years. bottom line, most traders saw bonds that continue to rise while stocks continue to move up. so far, the consensus has been completely wrong, larry, but then again it usually is. let's call it the great rotation in reverse. back to you. >> all right. many thanks, bob pisani. appreciate it. let's talk about how the key asian markets have opened after the big selloff. matthew taylor is joining us live from sydney, australia. the nikkei just opened. 8% on japan. pushing that market further into correction territory. of course, over the month of january we saw that japanese markets sink by more than 8%. we're down 2% yesterday and it looks as though we're going to have another drop for the japanese market of 2% today. well below that 15,000 level. 14,348 is where we sit on that main index. we're likely to see the selling in japan exacerbated. we have a stronger japanese yen. below the 101 level against the u.s. dollar, the strongest level for the yen since the middle of last year. the move

as stocks gained some ground today, the v.i.x. went into the red. that's where it's traded.have had this big swing in sentiment example tresed in the vix. two weeks ago we were talking about record call options, then record put options on the vix. people going from thinking it was going to spike to think it was going to plunge. what's going on? >> i think you're seeing a fair amount of some unwinding of positions. julie. offensive plays. there was a lot of call-buying going on at the november-december time period, even into january. we saw a lot of call buying and put selling. then the reverse, people rolling out of positions as the vix pushed up wards. i think it was a turning point where a lot of people felt that the vix has reached a peak and let's play for the pop in the market. >> where do we settle out here? do we find some stability? >> right now, short term it feels like it. as far as the options here, you saw a lot of selling the last couple of days. i think that plays into the mindset, the fact that we have the three-day weekend. there's only one trading day after