The bullish stampede stalled briefly at the 4287.75 target signaled in early May, but the close above signaled more upside over the near term to at least 4331.50, a Hidden Pivot resistance shown in the chart that has been more than two months in coming. There are some additional point 'A' lows that could be used to project an even higher target, but I have not used them because the 'B' high did not exceed any prior peaks. That doesn't necessarily mean the futures can't surpass 4331.50, only that a target above cannot be considered precisely reliable. Please note that a swoon touching either the red or green line, however unlikely, would generate an appealing 'mechanical' buy. ______ UPDATE (Jun 5, 6:43 p.m.): The S&Ps sympathetically weakened when AAPL plunged today, but this seemed scant reason for concern. It happened because too many amateur traders were expecting the long-awaited unveiling of Apple's ridiculously overpriced VR goggles to send the stock soaring. It did, albeit briefly and with help from the usual short-covering panic overnight. However, the subsequent dive was merely classic 'buy-the-rumor-sell-the-news' price action, probably signifying nothing. We'll monitor AAPL closely nonetheless, since the selloff began from a high just nine cents from the 184.86 rally target I'd drum-rolled in the AAPL tout just above. _______ UPDATE (Jun 8, 4:54 p.m.): The trendline shown in this weekly chart has been breached only slightly, but it should not have been breached at all if the rally were about to reverse. The line is authoritative because the two peaks it connects came ahead of precipitous selloffs. If the futures close above the line on Friday or trade decisively above it, that would be yet another warning to bears against fighting the rally aggressively.
Last Wednesday's textbook 'mechanical' buy at x=4120.00 left little doubt where the June contract is headed next. The 'D' target at 4288.75 seems all but certain to be hit early in this four-day week. If it pushes past the Hidden Pivot resistance by more than a couple of points on the first try, you may confidently assume that a new target at 4332.75 is in play. It is derived from the somewhat lower 'A' at 3937.00 recorded on March 24. _______ UPDATE (Jun 2, 9:25 a.m. EDT): The Hidden Pivot target at 4287.75 (a slight correction) still appears certain to be reached. The small delay relative to my forecast occurred because -- manifestly -- too many traders were bullish when the week began. You will have noticed that whatever factors that gave us good reason to be quite bearish are not exactly weighing on the stock market's walnut-size brain at the moment. When DaBoyz fist-pump ES obliviously past 4287.75, you can infer that 4331.50 is the next stop, a slight adjustment from the number given above.
The futures ended the week a hair shy of the 4244.00 'internal peak' recorded on February 3. Hold the applause if buyers should surpass it this week, however, since the 4382.75 peak from August 19 is the one that matters. A rally exceeding it would generate a bullish impulse leg of weekly-chart degree, putting in jeopardy the hopes and dreams of those who think an old-fashioned economic depression would be just the thing to asphyxiate the trivial concerns of wokeness, tame rampant paganism in America, rebuke a hopelessly corrupt political system and provide a reality check for an economic system that runs on debt and helium. Stay tuned to the Trading Room for white-hot trading tips while we're waiting. _____ UPDATE (May 24, 8:54 p.m.): The 'white-hot tip' mentioned above popped up serendipitously during this morning's tutorial session for advanced Pivoteers. It helped us fine-tune a textbook 'mechanical' buy after the futures finished mau-mauing bulls with what we will assume for now was a gratuitous dive. The rally target is the 4287.75 D pivot of this pattern, but we'll sit back for now and let bulls prove their case. ______ UPDATE (May 25, 9:59 a.m.): The selloff that has caused last night's short-squeeze to detumesce is not going anywhere, since the peak of the overnight rally exceeded yesterday's high by two ticks. That makes it impulsive, so expect a rebound. Also, I have corrected the chart accompanying the previous update.
Let's not waste too much time pondering what this sad sack of tailings is going to do next, since it hasn't done much of anything for more than a month. That's if you don't count the meaningless spasms that occur whenever the latest drivel from the Fed hits the tape. The futures will always be tradeable, of course, but only with the kind of close attention that's hard to muster with America in pre-holiday mode ahead of a three-day Memorial Day weekend that is just two weeks off. The work ethic, and all. I'll mention in passing that the June contract has triggered two profitable 'mechanical' shorts since the bear rally began in October, each producing a $12,000 win per contract. Considering the amount of time traders spent screwing the pooch in the process, that worked out to around $3.57 per hour. If ES falls anew to the red line, however, racking up a third 'mechanical' winner, I'll shift my focus to the 3424.50 downside target of the big pattern, shown here.
Friday's irrational exuberance was possible because there was no structural resistance between 4112 and 4161 (see chart inset). DaBoyz pushed DaFutures to within an inch of the higher number equal to the day-earlier peak, but they lacked the guts and conviction to get past it. Evidently unknown to them is that a follow-through to at least D=4199.75 is all but certain, barring a collision between Earth and an asteroid over the weekend. A pullback to the red line (4131.00), a trade I don't often recommend, would trigger a 'mechanical' buy, stop 4108.00. _____ UPDATE (May 10, 10:43 p.m.): A day of crazy price action generated many profitable trades that were reported in the chat room. The big, bullish picture is unchanged.
I've drawn a moderately bullish pattern with a 4261.25 rally target that lies 75 points above Friday's close. I'll recommend extra caution if shorting there because the target was sired by three possible 'fathers' -- i.e., the three closely spaced lows at the start of the move. If the futures blow past D, that would warrant sliding 'A' down to October's bottom and shifting 'B' one peak to the left. The resulting target is 4453.25, the most bullish number I'm comfortable billboarding at the moment. Here's the chart. Pivoteers might be interested to know that my justification for the larger pattern hinges on the subtlety of the 'B' high having slightly surpassed the circled 'external' peak. That makes A-B legitimately impulsive, and therefore capable in theory of hurling the futures as high as 4453.25. ______ UPDATE (May 4, 5:40 p.m.): A downtrend turned tortuous looks bound for this 4026.50 target. Let's see if sellers have enough gumption left after today's messy tussle to get there.
The S&PS have been in a constipated uptrend since around April 5, tacking on just 35 points, or around 0.7%, since regaining their footing after a steep rally begun in late March. The pattern shown projects a move to 4287.25, provided buyers can push this brick decisively above p=4191.88. They seemed content to beat each other's brains in all week, However, especially with Friday's excruciating chop. The week ended with a slight gain on a 'mechanical' buy triggered Thursday at the green line. We'll stick with the pattern shown for trading purposes since it's all we've got at the moment. _______ UPDATE (Apr 23, 5:43 p.m.): Because of today's hard selling, I've switched to a big, bearish reverse pattern with a 3980.00 target, or as low as 3818.00 if the higher number is breached decisively. The second target comes from fully extending the rABC pattern by using the marquee 'A'. If today's weakness is about to snowball, either pattern should work well for analysis or trading, including bottom-fishing at p=4058.50 of the larger pattern. Here's the chart.
A chart stretching back to November provides no compelling technical basis for saying anything interesting, let alone bullish or bearish, about what might happen next. It's anyone's guess, although the June contract would have to eat through thick layers of supply to achieve new recovery highs above February's 4244 peak. Poor earnings would help, since the mere expectation of them is usually enough to get stocks sold out before the news hits. With or without grim tidings to drive the rally, we can be assured that intraday highs and lows will continue to be predictable enough to give us an edge. Friday's peak, for instance, missed a 'D' Hidden Pivot target that was as obvious as the punchline of a mile-long stretch of Burma Shave signs. _______ UPDATE (Apr 20, 11:12 p.m.): There are some days when we should just avert our eyes and this was one of them. A sinking VIX belies the nuttiness animating stocks these days. We should start loading up on puts today and Monday, because I strongly doubt that these histrionics are torquing the market for an ebullient move higher. That seems doubly true with The Wall Street Journal's bullish spin on...everything starting to sound increasingly desperate. DaBoyz are getting ready to pull the plug.
I hate to be the bearer of good news, but the futures were actually a 'mechanical' buy when Friday's death spiral splattered on the green line in the closing minutes of the session. You are forgiven if you had no appetite for the trade, since neither you nor anyone else could have expected the weekend to bring a bullish resolution to Putin's potentially world-ending dilemma. Don't feel bad about missing this opportunity, however; it rates only a '6.8', since the A-B impulse leg was not exactly a killer wave of insatiable buying. The implication is that the futures will rally to p=4296.63 before taking out the pattern's 'C' low at 4138.75. Bet on it Sunday night if you wish, but I'd prefer to watch before hazarding a guess as to what the rest of the week will bring. Whatever happens, ALL rallies for the foreseeable future should be regarded as juicy short sales. If you want to see how this can be done without incurring too much risk, stay closely tuned to the chat room. _______ UPDATE (Mar 14, 8:21 a.m.): DaBoyz failed miserably at exhausting sellers over the weekend because none showed up. This means that the obligatory stage-managed, distributive, short-squeeze rally on the opening will be very subdued and brief if it happens at all. For that reason I'll suggest scratching the trade now. Please let me know in the chat room if you took the trade, since it triggered on Friday's closing bar and was showing a paper gain of more than $7,000 on four contracts at 6:00 a.m. this morning. The futures have traded up to within a tick of the green line when this update was posted, and gave since traded as high as 4224.25. _______UPDATE (Mar 14, 10:06 p.m.): This pattern has worked well
Last week's high fell almost precisely at the 'D' target of a middling rABC pattern, presumably maxing out the upside for the moment, and that is why we can use the bearish pattern shown to get a handle on this vehicle in the week ahead despite its obviousness and plain-vanillaness. Most immediately, that would imply bottom-fishing at p=4227.38 as a tightly stopped scalp-trade, and subsequently shorting at the green line (x), assuming it's hit via the right kind of bounce. For now, use 4227.38 as a minimum downside target for the near term. _______ UPDATE (Mar 7, 9:49 a.m. EST): It is unusual and mildly disconcerting for a perfectly located, 4227.38 midpoint support to have failed to gift us with a bottom-fishing trade. The futures fell to within an inch of the trigger price, then bounced sharply. The HP Method 'textbook ' provides two possible explanations: 1) the droolers and algos have finally begun to recognize the usefulness of this key HP level; or, 2) buying power is waxing and was too strong to allow a correction to reach p. I lean toward the latter interpretation, but without necessarily having it negate the former. The implication is that this rally will at least exceed C=4418.75. Here's the chart. [Further update, 10:40 a.m.: The bounce reached the green line (x=4323.06), but it did not qualify as a ‘mechanical’ short, since the bounce was coming off a low that had failed to touch p.] ______ UPDATE (Mar 7, 7:40 p.m.): Considering what's going on in the world, sellers looked most unimpressive as they batted down the futures a measly 146 points. When they come to their senses, look for the S&Ps to fall 400-600 points in a day, an event that would be commensurate with the excesses that have preceeded it. In the meantime,
