Directional Bias For The Day:

• S&P Futures are lower at 8:15 AM; turned negative from a bit positive and  declined 35 points since 6:00 AM;
• The odds are for a down day with elevated volatility; watch for a break above 4638.00 and 4650.00 for a change of sentiments
• Key economic data report due during the day:
  • Retail Sales ( -1.9% vs. 0.0% est.; prev. 0.2%) at 8:30 AM
  • Core Retail Sales ( -2.3% vs. 0.2% est.; prev. 0.1%) at 8:30 AM
  • Import Prices ( -0.2% vs. 0.2% est; prev. 0.7%) at 8:30 AM
  • Industrial Production ( 0.2% est.; prev. 0.5% ) at 9:15 AM
  • Capacity Utilization ( 77.1% est.; prev 76.8% ) at 9:15 AM
  • Prelim UoM Consumer Sentiments ( 70.0 est.; prev. 70.6) at 10:00 AM
  • Prelim UoM Inflation Expectations ( prev. 4.8%) at 10:00 AM

Directional Bias Before Open:

Key Levels:

• Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 4617.75, 4595,67, and 4582.24
• Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 4650.29, 4680.71, and 4707.24
• Key levels for E-mini futures: break above 4638.00, the low of 9:00 PM and break below 4609.00, the high of 11:00 AM on January 10

Pre-Open

• On Thursday at 4:00 PM, S&P futures (March 2022) closed at 4653.00 and the index closed at 4659.03 – a spread of about -6.00 points; futures closed at 4652.00 for the day; the fair value is +1.00
• Pre-NYSE session open, futures are lower – at 8:15 AM, S&P 500 futures were down by -31.00; Dow by -216; and NASDAQ by -132.00

Markets Around The World

• Markets in the East closed mostly lower – Singapore closed higher
• European markets are lower
• Currencies (Compared to two weeks ago):
  

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

• Commodities (Compared to two weeks ago):
  • Energy futures are higher
  • Precious metals are higher
  • Industrial metals are mostly higher
  • Soft commodities are mostly higher
• Treasuries (Compared to two weeks ago)
  • 10-years yield closed at 1.711%, up +19.6 basis points from two weeks ago;
  • 30-years is at 2.055%, up +13.0 basis points;
  • 2-years yield is at 0.895%, up +16.5 basis points;
  • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.816, up from 0.785
  • The 30-Year-&-10-Year spread is at 0.344, down from 0.410
• VIX
  • At 20.85 @ 7:45 AM; up from the last close; above 5-day SMA;
  • Recent high = 23.33 on January 10; low =  16.34 on January 4
  • Sentiment: Risk-Off

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

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed mostly lower on Thursday, January 13, in mostly higher volume.  Dow Jones Transportation Average closed lower and Russell 2000 traded in lower volume. The major indices opened, moved higher a bit in early trading, and then turned around in the afternoon session and closed near the lows.

From Briefing.com:

The S&P 500 fell 1.4% on Thursday, as the growth stocks succumbed to renewed selling interest in spite of lower interest rates. The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.5% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (-0.5%) and Russell 2000 (-0.8%) declined more modestly. The information technology (-2.7%), consumer discretionary (-2.1%), and communication services (-1.4%) sectors — which contain the mega-caps — underperformed along with the health care sector (-1.6%). The utilities (+0.5%), industrials (+0.2%), and consumer staples (+0.2%) sectors were the only sectors that closed higher. […] WTI crude futures decreased 0.7%, or $0.55, to $81.96/bbl today. The 2-yr yield, meanwhile, was unchanged at 0.89%. The U.S. Dollar Index decreased 0.1% to 94.87. […] As an aside, the S&P 500 fell below its 50-day moving average (4681) on a closing basis. […] The December Producer Price Index showed that the index for final demand increased 0.2% month-over-month (Briefing.com consensus 0.4%) while the index for final demand, less foods and energy, increased 0.5% (Briefing.com consensus 0.4%). That left the year-over-year increases on an unadjusted basis at 9.7% and 8.3%, respectively. […] Initial claims for the week ending January 8 increased by 23,000 to 230,000 (Briefing.com consensus 202,000) from last week’s unrevised level while continuing claims decreased by 194,000 to 1.559 million from last week’s revised level of 1.753 mln (from 1.754 mln). […] Dow Jones Industrial Average -0.6% YTD S&P 500 -2.3% YTD Russell 2000 -3.8% YTD Nasdaq Composite -5.4% YTD Overseas:  Europe: DAX +0.1%, FTSE +0.2%, CAC -0.5% Asia: Nikkei -1.0%, Hang Seng +0.1%, Shanghai -1.2% Commodities:  Crude Oil -0.56 @ 81.96 Nat Gas -0.56 @ 4.29 Gold -5.30 @ 1821.50 Silver -0.06 @ 23.17 Copper -0.03 @ 4.55