Directional Bias For The Day:

• S&P Futures are lower at 8:15 AM; broke below an up-sloping flag at 6:15 AM after climbing up from 4429.50 at 9:45 PM to 4476.00 at 5:30 AM
• The odds are for a down day with elevated volatility; watch for a break above 4477.75 for a change of sentiments
• Key economic data report due during the day:
  • CB leading Index ( 0.8% est.; prev. 1.1%) at 10:00 AM

Directional Bias Before Open:

Key Levels:

• Critical support levels for S&P 500 are 4466.45, 4447.47, and 4430.28
• Critical resistance levels for S&P 500 are 4477.95, 4500.00, and 4512.88
• Key levels for E-mini futures: break above 4477.75, the high of 5:00 AM and break below 4439.75, the low of 11:45 AM

Pre-Open

• On Thursday at 4:00 PM, S&P futures (March 2022) closed at 4474.25 and the index closed at 4482.73 – a spread of about -8.00 points; futures closed at 4474.75 for the day; the fair value is -0.50
• Pre-NYSE session open, futures are lower – at 8:15 AM, S&P 500 futures were down by -23.75; Dow by -84; and NASDAQ by -126.00

Markets Around The World

• Markets in the East closed mostly higher – Shanghai and Mumbai closed lower
• European markets are mixed – Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and STOXX 600 are up; the UK, France, and Spain are down
• Currencies (Compared to two weeks ago):
  

  Up	Down
  EUR/USD GBP/USD INR/USD	Dollar index USD/JPY USD/CHF AUD/USD NZD/USD 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 1.827%, up +12.2 basis points from two weeks ago;
  • 30-years is at 2.138%, up +5.0 basis points;
  • 2-years yield is at 1.055%, up +21.3 basis points;
  • The 10-Year-&-2-Year spread is at 0.772, up from 0.863
  • The 30-Year-&-10-Year spread is at 0.311, down from 0.383
• VIX
  • At 26.57 @ 7:00 AM; up from the last close; above 5-day SMA;
  • Recent high = 27.39 on December 20, 2021; low =  17.36 on January 12
  • Sentiment: Risk-Off

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

Previous Session

Major U.S. indices closed lower on Thursday, January 20, in mostly higher volume. Dow Jones Industrial Average traded in ower volume. Major indices opened higher and moved up in the morning trading but then hit resistance levels. After a few tries to break above, indices broke down in the afternoon and turned sharply negative. The decline accelerated in the last hour of trading.

From Briefing.com:

The S&P 500 declined 1.1% on Thursday in another disappointing session, as investors doubled down on the inclination to sell into strength. The benchmark index faded a 1.5% gain and closed the session down 7.0% from its all-time high. The Nasdaq Composite fell 1.3% after being up 2.1% intraday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.9% after being up 1.3% intraday. The Russell 2000 fell 1.9% after being up 2.0% intraday. Ten of the 11 S&P 500 sectors closed lower after all 11 traded in positive territory in the morning. The consumer discretionary (-1.9%), materials (-1.4%), and information technology (-1.3%) sectors led the retreat, while the utilities sector (+0.1%) eked out a gain. […] The 10-yr yield increased just one basis point to 1.83% while the 2-yr yield rose four basis points to 1.05% on continued expectations for a more hawkish Fed. The U.S. Dollar Index gained 0.4% to 96.85. WTI crude futures fell 0.7%, or $0.57, to $86.29/bbl. […] Initial claims for the week ending January 15 increased by 55,000 to 286,000 (Briefing.com consensus 211,000) while continuing claims for the week ending January 8 increased by 84,000 to 1.635 million. […] Existing home sales declined 4.6% m/m in December to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.18 million (Briefing.com consensus 6.42 million). Total sales in December were down 7.1% from a year ago. Total home sales in 2021, however, reached 6.12 million, which was up 8.5% year-over-year and the highest annual level since 2006. […] The Philadelphia Fed Index for January increased to 23.2 (Briefing.com consensus 20.0) from 15.4 in December. […] Dow Jones Industrial Average -4.5% YTD S&P 500 -6.0% YTD Russell 2000 -9.9% YTD Nasdaq Composite -9.5% YTD Overseas:  Europe: DAX +0.7%, FTSE -0.1%, CAC +0.3% Asia: Nikkei +1.1%, Hang Seng +3.4%, Shanghai -0.1% Commodities:  Crude Oil -0.05 @ 85.37 Nat Gas -0.18 @ 3.67 Gold -0.30 @ 1841.90 Silver +0.46 @ 24.66 Copper +0.09 @ 4.56