Post-open Review

Bisa-down target’s test bounces big.

We knew that quickly taking a sell signal was compelling because the bearish Globex-flip setup was triggering. That is, opening under Sunday night’s initial 2896.00 low, and Friday’s 2895.25 last relative low, could point down all morning.

Immediately breaking under the 2890.00 signal soon extended down to within 1 tick of this morning’s 2884.00 bias-down target.

Then the market bounced. And kept bouncing. It’s still bouncing.

The 2890.75 bias-down signal triggered, and narrowly missed invoking the brace period. Regardless, it was still being tested at 10:30 when recovering higher would have invalidated it. This is a bias-down environment, and probing above its bias-down signal requires being retraced or already rejected when the bias window lapses.

Fulfilling the bias-down target to within at least 3 ticks relieves it from becoming “unfinished business” if not actually touched. Meanwhile, the Globex-flip setup doesn’t expect this morning to recover, and a lot of buying pressure has been expended when it can’t gain traction for the effort. Back under 2890.75 would start to signal another downleg underway.

Spiking up on payrolls, recovering its retracement.

2884.75 is this morning’s bias-up signal, and it held a dip back down to it before the Employment Situation report. The reaction spiked up to 2893.50, but only spiked up — no complexity formed that otherwise would have required the spike’s retest.

But its reaction down held tests of 2887.50-2888.00 to avoid reversing momentum back down. The spike’s higher was retested despite no requirement.

Retesting the spike high also exceeded the 2892.00 bias-up target through 10:15 to renew the bias-up signal. The renewed bias-up target is 2902.00. That’s not required, and a probing above the pre-10:15 high would help to confirm. But Friday morning bias signals do tend to persist through the noon hour.

Meanwhile, already having fulfilled the bias-up target, a reversal down would be credible. More difficult to signal, but credible. Back under 2890.75 would start getting a benefit of the doubt that the uside is donw.

Upside objective met, rejected.

Opening unchanged within a relatively narrow range doesn’t offer any attractive entry parameters. Today was helped by knowing there was “unfinished business” above at yesterday’s 2884.75 open, which had gapped above all prior highs in a trend. And overnight volatility still suggested post-open price action would be choppy.

Narrow ranging into the open nevertheless soon surged up to 2885.75, neutralizing 2884.75 in the process. Neutralizing it, and holding it. The 2881.75 bias-up signal was touched in time to invoke the grace period, and then failed to trigger.

An offsetting test of the 2872.50 bias-down signal is in-play attacked so far down to 2875.00. Holding its test this morning would suggest that sellers are done, so the balance of the session can range choppily sideways ahead of tomorrow’s Employment Situation report. Leaving its test outstanding could maintain downside momentum into the noon hour.

Another post-open slide recovered.

Yesterday’s open was attacking the overnight highs and immediately began backing-and-filling. Its dip held support (a late-morning offsetting test of its bias-down signal) and recovered through the afternoon.

Today’s open was also attacking its overnight highs and also immediately began backing-and-filling. Its dip has already held support (the first half-hour’s touch of the  2875.50 bias-up signal), and also already recovered to and through overnight highs.

The open had touched the rally’s next higher objective at 2885.00, but 2779.00 had maintained its recovery through 9:45 to make the bias-up signal likely to be triggered a half-hour later. Triggering bias-up put into play its 2882.25 bias-up target, regardless of having been tested already post-open. Also likely was a retest of the 2886.25 overnight high’s “new Globex trend extreme.”

All of which is being probed up to 2889.00. Its too late to trigger the renewed bias-up signal targeting 2902.00. But exiting the bias environment above 2885.00 would likely target it, anyway. Not maintaining the probe above 2885.00 would not put into play 2902.00, and could start more backing-and-filling.

Range bound opening.

Piercing yesterday’s late 2873.50 high by 1 tick before this morning’s open was actually a delayed trending attempt. Overnight action had otherwise been contained, and fluctuating around unchanged. Delaying an overnight trending attempt until coming to within 60-90 minutes of the open tends to fail, and often reverses direction.

For essentially opening unchanged and within a sideways overnight range, post-open action has been as choppy and trendless as might be expected: Higher highs could have developed first, but didn’t. The opening bar touched the 2872.25 bias-up signal and dropped to 2867.00. Bouncing to 2871.00 reacted down lower to 2865.75, bouncing to 2871.00 again.

Having touched the bias-up signal before triggering no-bias, an offsetting test of its 2863.75 bias-down signal was put into play. Recovering the 2872.25 bias-up signal through 10:30 would have invalidated that, but the attempt has stopped 2 ticks short. Probing it this late would be “no-bias trending,” doomed to failure — but possibly not until having reached 2875.50.

Meanwhile, and inflection point at 2871.25 wasn’t touched until 10:30 instead of sooner, and isn’t yet overlapped by at least 3 ticks to be more than noise. Back under 2869.00 would start to signal the offsetting test of 2863.75 is underway.