Morning Notes – Monday, March 7, 2022

Directional Bias For The Day:

  • S&P Futures are lower at 9:00 AM; moved above 4300.00 from a low of 4238.00 at 3:30 AM;
  • The odds are for a down day with elevated volatility; watch for a break above 4329.75 for a change of sentiments
  • No key economic data report due during the day:

Directional Bias Before Open:

  • Weekly: In Correction
  • Daily: In Correction
  • 120-Min: Down-Side
  • 30-Min: Side-Down
  • 15-Min:  Down-Side
  • 6-Min: Side-Up

Key Levels:

  • Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 4302.37, 4284.98, and 4279.54
  • Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 4339.48, 4346.03, and 4370.45
  • Key levels for E-mini futures: break above 4329.75, the high of 3:45 PM on Friday and break below 4286.75, the low of 8:00 AM

Pre-Open

  • On Friday at 4:00 PM, S&P futures (March 2022) closed at 4325.50 and the index closed at 4328.87 – a spread of about -3.25 points; futures closed at 4327.25 for the day; the fair value is -1.75
  • Pre-NYSE session open, futures are lower – at 9:00 AM, S&P 500 futures were down by -15.50; Dow by -155; and NASDAQ by -56.75

Markets Around The World

  • Markets in the East closed lower
  • European markets are mostly lower – Itlay is higher
  • Currencies (Compared to two weeks ago):
    Up Down
    • Dollar index
    • AUD/USD
    • NZD/USD
    • INR/USD
    • EUR/USD
    • GBP/USD
    • USD/JPY
    • USD/CHF
    • USD/CAD
  • Commodities (Compared to two weeks ago):
    • Energy futures are higher
    • Precious metals are higher
    • Industrial metals are higher
    • Soft commodities are mostly higher
  • Treasuries (Compared to two weeks ago)
    • 10-years yield closed at 1.797%, down -13.5 basis points from two weeks ago;
    • 30-years is at 2.195%, down -5.6 basis points;
    • 2-years yield is at 1.492%, up +2.2 basis points;
    • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.302, down from 0.462
    • The 30-Year-&-10-Year spread is at 0.401, up from 0.319
  • VIX
    • At 33.17 @ 9:00 AM; up from the last close; above the 5-day SMA;
    • Recent high = 37.79 on February 24; low = 23.88 on February 16
    • Sentiment: Risk-Off (High-Volatility)

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

Monthly
  • December 2021 was a green candle that opened above the previous week’s real-body and closed higher with a small upper shadow and a slightly longer lower shadow; at all-time highs
    • Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K crossed above %D; above 90;
    • RSI-9 is turning up from above 75;
    • Above the upper band of a 120-month regression channel;
  • Confirmed Uptrend: sequence of higher highs and higher lows
Weekly:
  • The week ending on March 4 was a red spinning top candle
    • Stochastic (9,1, 3): %K is just above %D around 30; potential Bullish Divergence
    • RSI-9 is just below 40
  • The week was down -55.78 or -1.3%; the 5-week ATR  is 188.03
  • A down week; third in the last five weeks, and sixth in the previous ten weeks
  • The weekly pivot point=4341.73, R1=4403.92, R2=4478.97; S1=4266.68, S2=4024.49; No pivot levels were breached
  • Below 10-week EMA and 39-week SMA; above 89-week SMA
  • In Correction
Daily
  • A small red Hammer;
    • Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K crossed below %D from above 80
    • RSI-9 is just above 40; above 8-day EMA;
  • Below 20-day EMA, 50-day EMA, 100-day SMA, 200-day SMA
  • In Correction
2-Hour (E-mini futures)
  • Downtrend since 4:00 AM on January 4; bounced up from the February 24 low of 4101.75; moving sideways to down since 12:00 PM on February 25 between 4399.00 and 4275.00;
    • RSI-21 bounced up from near 30 to above 50
    • At/below EMA20, which is below EMA10 of EMA50
  • Bias: Down-Side
30-Minute (E-mini futures)
  • Bounced up from a low of 4238.00 at 3:30 AM to above 4320.00; broke above a downtrend line from March 3 high;
    • RSI-21 is moving around just below 50
    • Above EMA10 of EMA50, which is above #MA20
  • Bias: Side-Down
15-Minute (E-mini futures)
  • The Bollinger Band (20, 2.0) is moving up since 6:45 AM
  • The Bollinger Band is expanding since 6:15 AM; price first walked up the upper band and the declined to the middle band
    • Stochastic (9, 1, 3): %K crossed below %D at 8:15 AM;
  • Bias: Down-Side

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed lower on Friday, March 4, in higher volume. Major indices opened lower and then made day’s lows in the early morning trade. The indices rallied after 11:00 AM but then again declined in the afternoon.

For the week, the major US indices mostly closed lower in mostly higher volume. Dow Jones Transportation Average closed up for the week and NASDAQ Composite traded in lower volume. The markets in Asia and Europe mostly closed lower. The dollar index was up, energy futures were up, and metals and soft commodities were mostly lower. The US Treasury yields inched lower for the week.

From Briefing.com:

The S&P 500 fell 0.8% on Friday,

[…]

The Nasdaq Composite (-1.7%) and Russell 2000 (-1.6%) each declined by more than 1.5% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (-0.5%) outperformed on a relative basis with a 0.5% decline.

[…]

The market pared losses in the afternoon, though, leaving six of the 11 S&P 500 sectors in negative territory, including the heavily-weighted financials (-2.0%) and information technology (-1.8%) sectors at the bottom of the pack.

The energy sector rose 2.9%,

[…]

The utilities (+2.2%), real estate (+0.8%), health care (+0.5%), and consumer staples (+0.1%) sectors also closed higher amid some defensive positioning.

[…]

The yield curve flattened with the 2-yr yield declining by five basis points to 1.49% and the 10-yr yield declining by 12 basis points to 1.72%. The U.S. Dollar Index rose 0.7% to 98.50.

[…]
  • Hiring activity was strong in February, but wage increases were not. Nonfarm payrolls jumped by 678,000, yet average hourly earnings were unchanged. That left the year-over-year rate at 5.1%, down from 5.5% in January.
[…]
  • Dow Jones Industrial Average -7.5% YTD
  • S&P 500 -9.2% YTD
  • Russell 2000 -10.9% YTD
  • Nasdaq Composite -14.9% YTD