Directional Bias For The Day:

• S&P Futures are higher
• The odds are for a sideways to an up day with elevated volatility
• Key economic data report due during the day:
  • Philly Fed Manufacturing Index ( 31.5 vs. 40.8 est.; prev. 50.2) at 8:30 AM
  • Unemployment Claims ( 444K vs. 453K est.; prev. 473K) at 8:30 AM

Directional Bias Before Open:

Key Levels:

• Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 4083.84, 4061.85, and 4056.88
• Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 4125.99, 4153.70, and 4167.54
• Key levels for E-mini futures: break above 4114.25, the high of 1:00 AM and break below 4084.50, the low of 5:00 AM

Pre-Open

• On Wednesday at 4:00 PM, S&P futures (June 2021) closed at 4111.50 and the index closed at 4115.68 – a spread of about -4.25 points; futures closed at 4111.50 for the day; the fair value is +0.0
• Pre-NYSE session open, futures are mixed – at 9:00 AM, S&P 500 futures were up by +3.50; Dow down by -14, and NASDAQ up by +53.50

Markets Around The World

• Markets in the East closed mixed – Shanghai, Hong Kong, Mumbai, and Seoul closed down; Tokyo, Sydney, and Singapore closed up
• European markets are mostly higher – Spain is down
• Currencies (from two weeks ago):
  

  Up	Down
  EUR/USD GBP/USD	Dollar index USD/JPY USD/CHF AUD/USD NZD/USD USD/CAD INR/USD

• Commodities (from two weeks ago):
  • Energy futures are mixed
  • Precious metals are higher
  • Industrial metals are mixed
  • Most soft commodities are mostly down
• Treasuries (from two weeks ago)
  • 10-years yield closed at 1.683%, up +9.9 basis points from two weeks ago;
  • 30-years is at 2.387%, up +12.8 basis points;
  • 2-years yield is at 0.161%, up +0.4 basis points;
  • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 1.522, up from 1.427
• VIX
  • At 22.30 @ 7:45 AM; higher from the last close; above 5-day SMA;
  • Recent high =  28.93 on May 13; low =  18.61 on May 14
  • Sentiment: Risk-Off-Neutral

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

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed lower on Wednesday, May 19 in higher volume. Major indices gapped down at the open. All but NASDAQ Composite did not close the gap even though they recovered a large portion of the earlier loss later in the trading session.

From Briefing.com:

The S&P 500 declined 0.3% on Wednesday, although it was down as much as 1.6% in early action and spent most of the session on the comeback trail. The Nasdaq Composite (-0.03%) closed relatively unchanged after being down 1.7% intraday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (-0.5%) and Russell 2000 (-0.8%) underperformed but also closed off intraday lows. […] Profit-taking efforts were mainly concentrated in the S&P 500 energy (-2.5%), materials (-1.5%), financials (-0.6%), and industrials (-0.6%) sectors. The information technology (+0.3%) and communication services (+0.1%) sectors, however, sneaked their way into positive territory on a closing basis. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index rose 2.0%. […] The 10-yr yield settled higher by four basis points to 1.68% while the 2-yr yield was unchanged at 0.15%. The U.S. Dollar Index rose 0.5% to 90.16. WTI crude futures fell 3.4%, or $2.20, to $63.31/bbl. The CBOE Volatility Index increased just 3.9% to 22.18 after touching 25.96 at its high. […] Wednesday’s economic data was limited to the weekly MBA Mortgage Applications Index, which increased 1.2% following a 2.1% increase in the prior week. […] Russell 2000 +11.1% YTD Dow Jones Industrial Average +10.8% YTD S&P 500 +9.6% YTD Nasdaq Composite +3.2% YTD Overseas:  Europe: DAX -1.8%, FTSE -1.2%, CAC -1.4% Asia: Nikkei -1.3%, Hang Seng closed for holiday, Shanghai -0.5% Commodities:  Crude Oil -2.31 @ 63.19 Nat Gas -0.04 @ 2.98 Gold +13.70 @ 1882.10 Silver -0.36 @ 28.00 Copper -0.16 @ 4.58