E-Mini S&P

Squirrelly as ever, the futures gave up all of Monday's substantial gains in the final hour. The selloff was stalled at a 2030.25 'secondary pivot' in after-hours trading, but if and when it gives way, the June contract should be presumed headed to 2021.50, a Hidden Pivot support that can be bottom-fished with a stop-loss as tight as four ticks. A 'mechanical' short from 2030.25 could also be attempted, provided the set-up meets our criteria for this type of trade. If 2021.50 gives way easily and the selling starts to snowball, however, look for more downside to 2011.00. That target is derived by sliding 'A' up to April 4's 2071.50 peak. _______ UPDATE (April 12, 11:36 a.m. ET): The secondary pivot did NOT give way; instead, it provided support for DaBoyz to pop off a so-far 20-point short squeeze.

Today's weakness strongly suggests the futures will have to move lower before DaBoyz can goose stocks into yet another short-squeeze parabola. My hunch is that the best buying opportunity we'll see will come in the form of a 'counterintuitive' trade. In the accompanying chart, I've sketched two hypothetical examples (ignoring a minor 'Pontiac/Oldsmobile' low that sits between them). If the trade triggers in the final hour, I'd suggest hanging back until a better opportunity comes along next week. A long from the lower 'A' will probably enjoy better odds, since the possibility of its being breached will inspire more fear among traders. _______ UPDATE (April 10, 11:19 p.m. ET): Friday's gratuitous hump left my outlook unchanged.

Yesterday's bullish call went against a two-day tide of selling, allowing quite a few subscribers to get long at or very near the intraday low. Based on chat-room reports, I've established a long tracking position consisting of two contracts with a profit-adjusted cost basis of 2013.00. One should be offered to close at 2079.00, just beneath the secondary pivot of the original pattern, with an o-c-o stop-loss on the entire position (i.e., the two contracts that remain) at 2034.00. If we are successful in closing out the third contract at our price, we'll swing for the fences with the one contract that would remain.  That implies using the 2101.75 target of the chart I'd sketched and disseminated to subscribers Tuesday night. (Note: Rick's Picks does not track P&L, and any trade reported here must be confirmed by at least two subscribers, based on their actual experience. Visit our 24/7 chat room and share trading ideas and real-time results by taking a free trial subscription.) _______ UPDATE (April 7, 2:10 p.m. ET): With stocks getting thrashed today, subscribers were to have exited on a stop at 2013.00. This would have produced a theoretical profit on the position of $2100.

Two days of moderate selling may have inspired hopeful thoughts among bears, but notice in the chart (inset) that the weakness has left intact a bullish ABC pattern projecting 60 points higher. That would be equivalent to about 500 Dow points, presumably enough to bring bears back to reality. Moreover, in theory the pullback to the green line at 2034.63 is a 'mechanical' buy, stop 2012.00, for a ride to as high as 2101.75.  Instead, I'll recommend using the 'camouflage' technique if you should want to attempt bottom-fishing. That would entail initiating a trade via an uptrending abc pattern on the three-minute chart or lower. The goal would be to reduce the $1100 theoretical entry risk of the mechanical trade to more like $60. _______ UPDATE (12:14 p.m. ET):  The mechanical trade would have gotten you aboard with zero pain at the exact intraday low for a ride to as high as 2052.25. If you used 'camouflage,' entry would have been triggered at 2040.00, 10:41 a.m. ET, on the one-minute chart. I'll establish a tracking position if I hear from at least two people in the chat room who took the trade. ________ UPDATE (3:52 p.m.): In the chat room many subscribers reported nailing this trade, so I'll track two contracts with a profit-adjusted cost basis of 2013.00. This assumes two contracts of four initially purchased were exited at 2057.00, the midpoint Hidden Pivot resistance of the pattern I'd drawn. Now, offer a third contract to close at 2079.00, just beneath the secondary pivot. If the order fills, we'll go for broke with our last contract, offering it at the original 2101.75 ' target. The order should be held o-c-o (one-cancels-other) with a stop-loss on two contracts at 2034.00.

The futures were an easy 'mechanical' buy on Friday, although bids needed to be positioned down around x=2035 rather than at p=2057, since DaBoyz had to take the futures 16 points lower in order to dry up sellers ahead of the obligatory short squeeze. The subsequent 32-point rally could have produced a relatively quick profit of as much as $1600 per contract. It also left bears on the hook Sunday night, not that they are likely to experience much pain initially. That's because it has been several months since a Sunday night opening was other than extremely timid (even a rabid badger occasionally takesssss a rest). As noted here last week, stocks are either in short-squeeze mode or biding their time waiting to be squeezed about 95 percent of the time. Selloffs lasting more than a few hours are not merely rare these days, but non-existent. So what does this vehicle hold in store for us now? Most immediately, a possible 'mechanical' buying opportunity on a pullback to the midpoint pivot shown, at 2057.88, stop 2054.00. Your minimum price objective would be 2069.19, the secondary pivot, with a shot at D=2080.50. If the trade gets stopped out, I'll suggest trying again at 2046.56, stop 2035.00. Please note that trendline resistance flagged here earlier will come in around 2083.00 this week. ________ UPDATE (April 5, 2016, 11:57 a.m. ET): The futures are retreating this morning after having gotten nowhere near the 2080.50 rally target noted above.  This is a hopeful and promising sign as far as it goes, a perhaps fleeting glimmer of what normalcy might be like if the central bank did not exist.

We'll use the bullish pattern shown, with a 2101.75 target, to trade this vehicle in the days ahead. If the target is achieved, it would be equivalent to a Dow rally of about 500 points. Keep in mind that, along the way, trendline resistance flagged here yesterday is likely to make itself felt at 2083.75. You can short there aggressively if you've caught a piece of the rally.  One way to do so would be via a 'mechanical' bid at 2057.00, the midpoint Hidden Pivot. Although the futures have traded decisively above it, the rally has lacked sufficient buoyancy so far to trip a buy signal. For your further guidance, I've hypothetically sketched a series of bars that would change this.

We closed out a short tracking position moments after the close, when the futures upticked to new recovery highs. The trade would have produced a gain of $1350 per contract for anyone who followed the original recommendation exactly. Betting against a bull market that has been moving blithely higher for most of the last seven years is always going to be a longshot. However, the fact that we can get away with it -- get short at key targets and make a few bucks even when we are wrong -- is reason to keep trying. The futures now lie within 2.4% of the record high achieved back in November, but it is by no means a foregone conclusion that they will get there. For now, we can use the trendline shown (see inset) as a minimum upside objective, since there are no valid impulse legs at this level to permit a precise Hidden Pivot calculation. (Note: A target at 2054.00 has come into view. Night owls can try shorting there with a 2055.25 stop.) The resistance comes in at around 2068.00, and wouldn't it be shocking if the futures were sitting there at the closing bell, daring us to make their day.  We won't take the bait, however -- just watch and learn. If you absolutely must get short, I'd suggest using 'camouflage' when 2068 is very closely approached. That implies jumping on the first downtrending abc pattern that crops up on the 5-minute chart or lower. _______ UPDATE (March 30 2:27 p.m. ET): I've revised the trendline so that a 2083.75 target obtains for this week. It looks like a promising place to anticipate a tradable top, as well as to target a long position from current levels. The slope is about -0.75 points per week.

We hold a tracking position consisting of a single contract shorted one tick beneath last week's high, 2047.50. Subsequent profit-taking on three-quarters of the initial position has raised its effective cost basis to 2074.75, indicating a paper profit of about $2500 per contract at current prices.  We'll let the position run for now, using the 2047.75 stop-loss advised here earlier.  That means we are 'locked in' unless the futures recover to new highs. If that should occur, we'll book a profit and look forward to getting short yet again, presumably with the futures at heights at or above the record levels achieved last summer. More immediately, the 2015.38 corrective target is an play -- a minor Hidden Pivot support whose decisive breach would portend still more downside to d=2007.25. Alternatively, a print above 2039.75 would reignite last Thursday's short-squeeze, opening a path to as high as 2054.00 over the near term.

In the chat room, several subscribers reported using the 2047.25 target I'd been drum-rolling here for a week to get short a single tick off the intraday high. The futures fell nine points thereafter, allowing us to cover half of the position for a profit of as much as $450 per contract. For purposes of establishing a tracking position, I've used 2040.00 as the exit price, 1.75 points off the retracement low. That leaves us short two contracts whose cost basis I've adjusted to 2054.50. For now, use a stop-loss at 2051.25. We should entertain no illusions about having nailed a major peak in a bull market that has been blithely chugging along for more than seven years. The purpose of the trade, besides satisfying the urge that each of us permabears has to get short at an important top, is to do so with relatively little stress, and to have a chance of turning a profit even if it turns out that we've been wrong. Of course, this has been true in each and every instance where we've tried this gambit. But that hasn't stopped us from making a few bucks in the process, as seems very likely to become the case here, while having good fun. _______ UPDATE (March 23, 10:55 a.m. ET): The trade has continued to go our way, with a so-far low today at 2031.50 that would have produced an $800 profit per contract for anyone who got short as advised.  Cover a third contract at 2034.25. _______ UPDATE (March 23, 6:53 p.m. ET): The futures traded down to 2026.75, allowing us to easily cover for 2034.25 a third contract of four shorted a day earlier at 2047.25.  Imputing the gain thus far to our tracking position leaves us with a single contract whose effective