Directional Bias For The Day:

• S&P Futures are up; moving higher since 3:30 AM after making a near double bottom;
• The odds are for an up day with elevated volatility – watch for break below 2853.25 for change of fortune
• China trade and tariff news is still impacting the sentiments
• Key economic data due:
  • Building Permits (1.30M vs. 1.29M est; prev. 1.29M ) at 8:30 AM
  • Housing Starts (1.24M vs. 1.21M est.; prev. 1.17M) at 8:30 AM
  • Philly Fed Manufacturing Index ( 16.6 vs. 10.0 est.; prev. 8.5) at 8:30 AM
  • Unemployment Claims (212K vs. 220K est.; prev. 228K ) at 8:30 AM

Markets Around The World

• Markets in the East closed mostly up – Tokyo and Seoul were down
• European markets are higher
• Currencies:
  

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

• Commodities:
  

  Up	Down
  Crude Oil Copper Coffee Cotton Cocoa	NatGas Gold Silver Platinum Palladium Sugar

• Bonds
  • 10-yrs yield is at 2.396%, up from May 15 close of 2.379%;
  • 30-years is at 2.830%, up from 2.823%
  • 2-years yield is at 2.200%, up from 2.163%
  • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.198, down from 0.216

Key Levels:

• Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 2848.47, 2839.00 and 2820.08
• Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 2862.58, 2873.67 and 2891.31
• Key levels for eMini futures: break above 2868.00, the high of 7:00 AM and break below 2841.75, the low of 3:30 AM

Pre-Open

• On Wednesday, at 4:00 PM, S&P future (June contract) closed at 2853.00 and the index closed at 2850.96 – a spread of about +2.00 points; futures closed at 2855.00 for the day; the fair value is -2.00
• Pre-NYSE session open, futures are higher – at 8:45 AM, S&P 500 futures were up by +7.75; Dow by +88 and NASDAQ by +1.75

Directional Bias Before Open

• Weekly: Uptrend
• Daily: Uptrend under pressure
• 120-Min: Down-Side
• 30-Min: Up
• 15-Min: Up
• 6-Min: Up-Side

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

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed higher on Wednesday, May 15 in mixed volume. Dow Jones Transportation Average and Russell 2000 traded in higher volume and Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite traded in lower volume. Most indices made bullish engulfing candle after testing the lows of Tuesday.

From Briefing.com:

The S&P 500 advanced 0.6% on Wednesday, overcoming a lower start that was attributed to concerns about slowing growth. The market, though, has shown a propensity to bounce on any positive-sounding trade headline, and today was no different.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (+0.5%) and the Nasdaq Composite (+1.1%), like the S&P 500, were each down as much as 0.7% intraday before rallying. The Russell 2000 increased 0.3% after being down as much as 0.9%.

[…]

The S&P 500 communication services (+2.1%), information technology (+1.0%), consumer staples (+0.8%), and consumer discretionary (+0.8%) sectors outperformed the broader market. The financials (-0.5%), materials (-0.2%), and utilities (-0.1%) sectors were the lone groups to finish lower.

[…]

The data underpinned the buying interest in U.S. Treasuries, which only tapered off slightly during the rally in equities. The 2-yr yield and the 10-yr yield declined four basis points each to 2.16% and 2.38%, respectively. The U.S. Dollar Index increased 0.1% to 97.58. WTI crude increased 0.4% to $62.06/bbl.

[…]

• Total retail sales declined 0.2% (Briefing.com consensus +0.2%) after increasing an upwardly revised 1.7% (from 1.6%) in March. Excluding autos, retail sales rose just 0.1% in April (Briefing.com consensus +0.6) following an upwardly revised 1.3% increase (from 1.2%) in March.
o The key takeaway from the report is that consumers curtailed discretionary spending on goods in April in a way that will temper the outlook for Q2 GDP growth.
• Industrial production declined 0.5% in April (Briefing.com consensus +0.1%) following an upwardly revised 0.2% increase (from -0.1%) in March. Total capacity utilization fell to 77.9% (Briefing.com consensus 78.8%) from a downwardly revised 78.5% (from 78.8%) in March.
o The key takeaway from the report is the understanding that it marked the fourth straight month in which there was no growth in manufacturing output.
• Business inventories were unchanged in March, as expected, following an unrevised 0.3% increase in February. Business sales increased 1.6% on the heels of an upwardly revised 0.2% increase (from 0.1%) in February.
o The key takeaway from the report is that the inventory growth on a yr/yr basis (+5.0%) continues to outpace sales growth (+3.7%), which should keep price pressures in check.
• The weekly MBA Mortgage Application Index declined 0.6% following a 2.7% increase in the prior week.
• The Empire State Manufacturing Survey for May increased to 17.8 (Briefing.com consensus 7.7) from the prior month’s reading of 10.1.
• The NAHB Housing Market Index increased to 66 (Briefing.com consensus 64) from 63 in April.