The futures have been struggling for more than a week to reach a modest target at 1385.25, but their slog evinced a hint of failure on Thursday with a peak that missed impulsing above the previous day’s high by just two ticks. It is tempting to infer that the rally is losing its guts, even with a flood tide of global funny money to float stocks higher.  Lest we pronounce the Mother of All Bear Rallies dead prematurely, however, we’ll infer that the broad averages are simply waiting for the mote of “good” news it will take to re-animate the hysteria of shorts to goose this vehicle to its next rally target. More than any other force, it is short-covering that has been driving the rally through resistance levels for three years. Meanwhile, and most immediately, night owls can use the 1362.75 target of the pattern show to bottom-fish with a stop-loss as tight as 1.00 point. _______ UPDATE (9:39 a.m. EST): Sunday night’s stage-managed weakness overshot the target, bottoming at  1360.50 and stopping us out for a nominal loss per contract of $50.50.  The action is short-term bearish, notwithstanding the weak short-squeeze rally into this morning’s opening.  For the record, if you’d tried to use “camouflage” for getting in near the low, there were no single-bar points ‘C’ to work with, and therefore no entry opportunities of the kind we seek. Would you like to learn how we use the ‘camouflage’ trading technique to significantly reduce entry risk? Click here for details