E-Mini S&P

Looking for clues as the new week begins, I waited for index futures to open Sunday night before posting touts.  Lo, the action is stagnant early in the evening, with the E-Mini S&P unchanged and December Gold off $13, trading around 1828.00, after DaSleazeballs short-squeezed the opening bar to 1841.50.  Monday is a travel day for me, but in my absence the chat room is all but certain to offer a rich vein of timely insights.

The futures spent most of the day playing footsies with the 1151.50 midpoint support of a minor bearish pattern that projects to 1135.75 .  We know from last night/yesterday morning's malevolent price swings that it will probably avail us little to speculate on where this vehicle will be trading come sunrise.  As always, however, there will be no mystery about it, nor any great difficulty in trading the swings, for camouflageurs who pay close attention to impulsive thrusts on the lesser charts. Lastly, let me mention that a 1215.00 rally target given here previously is still very much in play.

Buyers made slow headway yesterday toward our 1215.00 target, but we can use another, lesser Hidden Pivot at 1184.00 today to get a more subtly nuanced reading of their gumption (or perhaps lack thereof). That Hidden Pivot should show enough stopping power to be shortable, so we'll do so officially with an 1185.25 stop-loss.  If you can work the trade using camouflage, that could help to cut down the risk even more. _______ UPDATE (10:31 a.m. EDT):  We were stopped out for a theoretical loss of $63 per contract when the Da Boyz short-squeezed the opening bars to 1188.50. It proved to be a bull trap, since the futures fell 25 points in less than an hour.  Practically speaking, this little bit of nastiness was absolute perfection, since it not only made it unbearable for shorts to stick with positions initiated yesterday or overnight, it made it darned near impossible for bears on the sidelines to catch what would have been a very profitable ride south.  There were no short-entry spots for camouflageurs even on the one-minute chart.

Yesterday's ostensibly fabulous rally suspiciously fell 1.50 points shy of the 1163.25 midpoint target I'd flagged here. A faint hint of chicken-heartedness, perhaps?  Rather than diss the effort prematurely, let's give them another chance today to get past the Hidden Pivot. Meanwhile, by hesitating almost precisely where we might have expected, buyers told us that the futures will go to exactly 1215.00 if and when they blow past 1163.25.  From there, all it would take to refresh the bullish impulse on the hourly chart would be a print at 1171.50, a tick above a peak made last Thursday on the way down.

Price action at the moment is unworthy of our attention, but keep loosely in mind the midpoint resistance at 1163.25 if DaBoyz should succeed in getting a short squeeze going. They'll have plenty of opportunities to do so in the future, and we should never count the thieves out,  but at the moment, they seem burdened by the news. On the hourly chart, it would take 1165.00 -- slightly above our pivot -- to turn the short-term outlook bullish.

The futures played toe-sies on Friday with a Hidden Pivot midpoint support I'd flagged at 1113.00.  The intraday low at 1117.00 fell a tad shy of our benchmark, but if it should fail on a closing basis, look for more carnage down to as low as 1019.50, its 'D' sibling.  More immediately, there were no compelling opportunities when the action stopped on Friday, but a rally today hitting 1136.50 should be viewed as a possible camouflage opportunity to get short.  That is the midpoint resistance, on the hourly chart, of A=1118.50 (7:30 a.m. EDT); B=1153.25, and C=1119.00. ________ UPDATE (8:50 a.m. EDT):  With Sunday night's wild bounce, a new pattern projects to at least 1163.25, the Hidden Pivot midpoint of A=1103.00 (6/11); B=1206.75 (8/17).  We'll call this the Qaddafi rally, since his presumably imminent departure could not possibly have positive implications for U.S. stocks.  That won't stop the U.S. new media form saying this is so, however.

The pattern shown projects to 1019.50 by way of a midpoint at 1113.00. That would put the Dow down around 10,000 -- hardly an assault on logic, technical or otherwise.  Camouflage opportunities are best pursued at swing highs or lows defined on the hourly chart, but there is little point in trying to guess where they are likely to occur until trading begins on Friday.

We've been fixated on a not-terribly-ambitious 1227.25 rally target in the E-Mini S&P for so long that DaBoyz' weakness is becoming palpable, as though they had been exposed to Kryptonite or something.  While it's pleasant to see the bunko artists in such a weakened state, they have yet to be brought to their knees, let alone be decimated.  Patience is called for -- and also diligence in looking for small patterns than can get us short.

A bull trap sprung in the opening hour yesterday has given way to a moderate sell-off that was still in progress early Thursday morning. It has the potential to hit 1173.00 over the near term, or 1167.25 if any lower. That second number is tied to a Hidden Pivot midpoint at 1179. 75, so night owls should look for a camouflage opportunity to get long there.  However, if there is no tradable bounce, odds of more weakness down to at least 1167.25 will shorten.  Alternatively, DaBoyz would need to short-squeeze this hoax above 1193.00 to temporarily restore control to the algo traders. The significance of that number is shown in the accompanying chart.  _______ UPDATE (9:53 a.m. EDT):  The futures are getting savaged this morning, down the equivalent of 35o Dow points on the opening.  The so far low at 1150.25 has come within a single tick of the Hidden Pivot support of a pattern created overnight (15m, A=1183.25 at 1:45 a.m., B=1162.25 at 5:30 a.m.), but if the low gives way, a new wave of selling could push this pup all the way down to 1141.25 (A=1192.50).