Market Remarks

Morning Notes – Thursday March 1, 2018

Directional Bias For The Day:

  • S&P Futures are higher; moving higher since 6:30 AM; within a horizontal channel between 2722.50 and 2698.75, since 4:00 PM on Wednesday
  • Competing forces in play – bearish pressure on daily and 2-hour charts; bounce from oversold on 30-minute and 6-minute charts
  • Odds are for a down day I greater volatility – watch for break above 2722.50 for a change of fortunes
  • Key economic data:
    • Core PCE (0.3% vs. 0.3% est.) at 8:30 AM
    • Personal Spending ( 0.2% vs. 0.2% est.) at 8:30 AM
    • Unemployment Claims (210K vs, 226K est.) at 8:30 AM
    • ISM Manufacturing PMI (est. 58.7) at 10:00 AM

Markets Around The World

  • Markets in the East were mixed – Shanghai and Hong Kong were up; Tokyo, Sydney and Mumbai were down; Seoul was closed
  • European markets are lower
  • Currencies:
    Up Down
    • Dollar index
    • USD/JPY
    • USD/CHF
    • NZD/USD
    • USD/CAD
    • EUR/USD
    • GBP/USD
    • AUD/USD
  • Commodities:
    Up Down
    • Sugar
    • Coffee
    • Crude Oil
    • NatGas
    • Gold
    • Silver
    • Copper
    • Platinum
    • Palladium
    • Cocoa
    • Cotton
  • Bonds
    • 10-yrs yield closed at 2.868% on February 28 down from February 27 close of 2.908%;
    • 30-years closed at 3.127%, down from 3.174%
    • 2-years yield is at 2.250%, up from 2.266%
    • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.618 down from 0.642

Key Levels:

  • Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 2697.77, 2676.35 and 2648.87
  • Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 2735.61, 2748.18 and 2758.18
  • Key levels for eMini futures: break above 2722.50 the high of 3:30 AM and break below 2698.00, the low of 6:30 AM

Pre-Open

  • On Wednesday, at 4:00 PM, S&P future (March contract) closed at 2713.50 and the index closed at 2713.83 – a spread of about -0.25 points; futures closed at 2714.50 for the day; the fair value is -1.00
  • Pre-NYSE session open, futures price action is mixed – at 9:00 AM, S&P 500 futures were up by +3.50; Dow up by +24.00; and NASDAQ down by -6.50

Directional Bias Before Open

  • Weekly: Uptrend Under Pressure
  • Daily: Uptrend Under Pressure
  • 120-Min: Side-Down
  • 30-Min: Down-Side
  • 15-Min: Down-Side
  • 6-Min: Down

The trend and patterns on various time frames for S&P 500 are:

Monthly
  • Confirmed Uptrend
  • December 2017 closed higher; index has been higher for the nine straight months; it has only one down month, March 2017, since October 2016
  • Uptrend resumption since Feb 08, 2016 after a pull back of -15.2%
Weekly:
  • The week ending on February 23 was a small green candle with almost no upper shadow and small lower shadow following a large green bodied candle with +4.3% advance, which had followed a -5.2% decline previous week
  • Last week’s pivot point=2730.94, R1=2764.12, R2=2780.93; S1=2714.13, S2=2680.95; no pivot levels were breached;
  • An up week; two in a row, third in last five weeks and seventh in last ten weeks
  • Broke above a down sloping flag on April 24 2017;
    • flag-low was 2322.25 during 27-Mar-17 week; shorter flag-pole length is 317.19 and longer flag-pole length is 590.88;
    • 100% extension target of shorter flag-pole near 2639.41 is achieved; and the 161.8% extension target is near 2835.46
    • 61.8% extension target of longer flag-pole near 2687.41 is achieved; the 100% extension target is near 2913.13
  • Broke above a down-sloping flag on November 14, 2016;
    • the flag low was 2083.79 during 31-Oct-16 week; the shorter flag-pole length is 202.13 and the longer flag-pole length is 383.71;
    • 261.8% extension target of shorter flag-pole near 2612.97 is achieved
    • the 161.8% extension target of longer flag-pole near 2704.63 is achieved; the 261.8% extension target is near 3088.34
  • Last swing low, 2322.25, was the low on March 27, 2017
  • Below 10-week EMA; at 39-week SMA and above 89-week SMA
  • Uptrend under pressure
Daily
  • A large red candle with shaved bottom and small upper shadow following bearish engulfing candle; index declining from between 61.8% and 78.6% retracement of decline from February high
  • Last big pattern, a down-sloping flag in June 2017, was broken to the upside on July 13, 2017; in August the index declined and tested the broken upper limit of the flag; since then the index has made three very small flags; it broke to the upside of the last flag on January 2
  • Bounced off 200-day SMA on February 9
  • Below 20-day EMA; at 50-day EMA; above 100-day SMA and 200-day SMA
  • Uptrend under pressure
2-Hour (e-mini future)
  • Moving down since 10:00 AM on February 27 in steps; sideways consolidation around 271000 since 4:00 PM on Wednesday
  • RSI-9 mostly fluctuating between 25 and 50 since 10:00 AM on February 27
  • Below 20-bar EMA, which is below EMA10 of EMA50
  • Bias: Side-Down
30-Minute (e-mini future)
  • A horizontal channel is emerging since 4:00 PM on Wednesday – high near 2722.50 and low near 2703.00
  • RSI mostly below 50 since 10:30 AM on February 27 with one head-&-shoulder pattern above it
  • Below 20-bar EMA which is below 50-bar EMA
  • Bias: Down-Side
15-Minute (e-mini future)
  • Bollinger Band (20, 2.0) is moving sideways  since 10:00 PM on Wednesday
  • The band contracted for few bars after midnight; expanded at 1:30 AM
  • RSI is mostly between 40 and 65 since 1:00 AM
  • The Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K made a bullish divergence at 6:45 AM and is nearing 80
  • Bias: Down-Side

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices declined on Wednesday February 28, following a bearish engulfing candle on Wednesday. The volume was higher except for Dow Jones Transportation Average.

  • S&P 500 Sectors
Up Down
  1. Consumer Discretionary
  2. Consumer Staples
  3. Energy
  4. Materials
  5. Industrials
  6. Finance
  7. Technology
  8. Heath Care
  9. Utility
  10. Real Estate
  11. Telecom

 

Exit mobile version