Morning Notes – Thursday March 15, 2018

Directional Bias For The Day:

  • S&P Futures are higher; moving sideways since 10:30 PM on Wednesday
  • Odds are for a sideways to down day – watch for break above 2762.25 and below 2752.25 for change of fortunes
  • Key economic data:
    • Unemployment Claims (6K vs. 227K est.) at 8:30
    • Empire State Manufacturing Index (22.5 vs. 14.9 est.) at 8:30 AM
    • Philly Fed Manufacturing Index (22.3 vs. 23.1 est.) at 8:30 AM

Markets Around The World

  • Markets in the East were mixed – Shanghai, Sydney and Mumbai were down; Hong Kong, Tokyo and Seoul were up
  • European markets are mostly higher – Spain and Switzerland are down
  • Currencies:
    Up Down
    • Dollar index
    • USD/CHF
    • USD/CAD
    • EUR/USD
    • GBP/USD
    • USD/JPY
    • AUD/USD
    • NZD/USD
  • Commodities:
    Up Down
    • Crude Oil
    • NatGas
    • Gold
    • Silver
    • Copper
    • Platinum
    • Palladium
    • Sugar
    • Coffee
    • Cotton
    • Cocoa
  • Bonds
    • 10-yrs yield is at 2.812% down from March 14 close of 2.817%;
    • 30-years is at 3.050%, down from 3.058%
    • 2-years yield is at 2.266%, unchanged
    • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.546, down from 0.551

Key Levels:

  • Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 2744.38, 2740.45 and 2728.05
  • Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 2762.89, 2777.11 and 2783.27
  • Key levels for eMini futures: break above 2762.25.50, the high at 3:30 AM and break below 2752.25, the low of 7:00 AM

Pre-Open

  • On Wednesday, at 4:00 PM, S&P future (June contract) closed at 2754.25 and the index closed at 2749.48 – a spread of about +5.75 points; futures closed at 2754.00 for the day; the fair value is +0.25
  • Pre-NYSE session open, futures price action is to the upside – at 9:00 AM, S&P 500 futures were up by +3.00; Dow by +59.00; and NASDAQ by +6.00

Directional Bias Before Open

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

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 March 9 was a large bullish engulfing candle, over a bearish engulfing candles, with almost no upper and lower shadows
  • Last week’s pivot point=2749.63, R1=2823.51, R2=2860.45; S1=2712.69, S2=2638.81; R1 pivot levels was breached;
  • An up week following a down week; 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 body candle that engulfed Monday’s red candle; just above the upper limit of  a symmetrical triangle that was broken to the upside; it may act as a support
  • 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
  • Above 20-day EMA; above 50-day EMA; above 100-day SMA and 200-day SMA
  • Uptrend under pressure
2-Hour (e-mini future)
  • Broke below a double top pattern; achieved the 100% extension target to the downside; turned down from the broken lower limit following a bounce;
  • Declining since 2:00 AM on March 12;
  •  RSI-9 declining since 2:00 AM on March 12; below a downtrend line
  • Below 20-bar EMA, which is below EMA10 of EMA50
  • Bias: Up-Side
30-Minute (e-mini future)
  • Moving  down since 9:30 AM on March 13; below a downtrend line
  • RSI between 40 and 55 since 10:00 PM on March 14
  • At 20-bar EMA, which is below 50-bar EMA
  • Bias: Down
15-Minute (e-mini future)
  • Bollinger Band (20, 2.0) is moving sideways since 4:45 PM on March 14
  • The band is narrow since NYSE close
  •  RSI is between 40 and 65 since mid-day on March 14
  • The Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K is rising since 6:45 AM
  • Bias: Down-Side

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed down on Wednesday March 14. Most completed a three-day evening star candlestick formation. The volumes was mixed.

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