Directional Bias For The Day:

• S&P Futures are a little higher at 8:00 AM; moving sideways to up within an up-sloping flag since 3:30 PM
• The odds are for a sidewyas to an up day with elevated volatility – watch for a break above 4467.25 or a break below 4448.00 for more clarity
• The major economic data report due during the day:
  • Building Permits ( 1.47M est.; prev. 1.44M) at 8:30 AM
  • Housing Starts ( 1.45M est.; prev. 1.43M ) at 8:30 AM
  • Industrial Production ( 0.3% est.; -0.5%) at 9:15 AM
  • Capacity Utilization Rate ( 79.1% est.; prev. 78.9%) at 9:15 AM
  • FOMC Meeting Minutes at 2:00 PM

Directional Bias Before Open:

Weekly: Uptrend Daily: Uptrend Under Pressure 120-Min: Down

30-Min: Down-Side 15-Min: Side 6-Min: Side

Key Levels:

• Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 4432.19, 4416.79, and 4408.46
• Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 4454.55, 4460.27, and 4478.87
• The key levels for E-mini futures are 4467.25, the high at 4:30 AM, and 4448.00, the low at 7:00 AM

Pre-Open

• On Tuesday at 4:00 PM, S&P futures (September 2023) closed at 4454.00, and the index closed at 4437.86 – a spread of about +16.25 points; the futures closed at 4454.00; the fair value is +0.0
• Pre-NYSE session open, futures were a little higher- at 7:45 AM, S&P 500 futures were up by +2:00, Dow by +23, and NASDAQ by +5.50

Markets Around The World

• Markets in the East closed mostly mixed – Mumbai closed higher
• European markets are mostly higher – the UK and Italy are lower
• Currencies (Compared to two weeks ago):

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

• Commodities (Compared to two weeks ago):
  • Energy futures are mixed
  • Precious metals are lower
  • Industrial metals are mostly lower
  • Soft commodities are mostly lower
• Treasuries (Compared to two weeks ago)
  • The 10-year yield closed at 4.221, up +17.0 basis points from two weeks ago;
  • The 30-year is at 4.319%, up +21.4 basis points
  • The 2-year yield is at 4.954%, up +4.2 basis points;
  • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at -0.733, up from -0.861
  • The 30-Year-&-10-Year spread is at 0.098, up from +0.054
• VIX
  • At 16.40 @ 7:15 AM; up from the last close; below the 5-day SMA;
  • Recent high = 18.14 on August 8; low = 12.73 on June 22
  • Sentiment: Risk-Off

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

Weekly:	The week ending on August 11 was a relatively small Spinning Top candle near the close of the prior week’s large red candle. Stochastic (9,1, 3): %K is below the %D; RSI-9 declined to just above 60 from above 75 The week was down -13.98 or -0.3%; the 5-week ATR  is 98.39 A down week, second in the last five weeks, and fourth in the previous ten weeks; The weekly pivot point=4478.47, R1=4512.95, R2=4561.86; S1=4429.56, S2=4395.08; no pivot levels were breached At/above 10-week EMA and 39-week SMA; below 89-week SMA Uptrend
Daily	A relatively large red candle with no upper shadow and a small lower shadow. Closed at the lowest level since July 10. At the lower bound of an up channel that has been forming since March 10, 2023 Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K crossed below the %D; below five RSI-9 is around 35; above 8-DMA Below 20-day EMA; at/above 50-day EMA; above 100-day SMA, and 200-day SMA; Uptrend Under Pressure
2-Hour (E-mini futures)	Trending down since July 27 making a sequence of lower highs and lower lows; broke below a Horizontal Channel bounded between 4609.25 and 4553.75 on August 2 – the 161.8% extension target is achieved; RSI-21 is just above 30 from below 25 Below EMA20, which is below EMA10 of EMA50 Bias: Down
30-Minute (E-mini futures)	Moving sideways since 3:30 PM on Tuesday around the lower bound of a horizontal channel between 4517.00 and 4459.00, after breaking above it once. RSI-21 is moving around 40 Below EMA20, which is below EMA10 of EMA50 Bias: Down-Side
15-Minute (E-mini futures)	The Bollinger Band (20, 2.0) has been moving sideways to up since 9:30 PM, forming an up-sloping flag. The Bollinger Band has been a bit expanded and flat since 4:15 AM Bias: Side

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed lower on Tuesday, August 15, in mostly higher volume. Dow Jones Transportation Average traded in lower volume.

The market opened lower and then traded lower for the rest of the day. All S&P sectors closed lower.