Trading Plan for 2/14 Globex

[pay]At the close (How the prior session ended)
Friday last hour dip stopped 2 ticks short of 1067.50, which had defined the session’s mid-point. The optimism wasn’t too excessive to prevent an 11-point surge into the close, as participants clearly expected positive developments this weekend. That extra optimism might prove to be overdone.

Thursday’s 1076.50 close was under prior highs, so the gap back up to it didn’t require being filled. The gap would have required being filled if Friday had closed back above Thursday afternoon’s 1073.75 lows.

The first half of Friday’s last half-hour surge filled the gap back up to Thursday’s close. Now Its attraction has been neutralized, before it could be relied upon to attract price higher after the weekend.

Pattern points (And technical influences)
The other half of Friday’s last half-hour surge retested Thursday evening’s 1079.75 high within 2 ticks. It, too, didn’t required no retest. And that was just futures – the cash session’s equivalent close was 1075.00. Since this discount was part of trending to a new intraday extreme, it is going to try attracting price down to it, undermining Friday’s late rally.

Friday’s last half-hour 11-point surge from 1068.00 had threatened to be a plunge to new session lows. The last untested support held its test at 1069.00, below which nothing remains. This may still be case after good news over the weekend elicits a knee-jerk reaction among buyers – and if there’s no good news over the weekend at all.

Bottom line (My underlying premise)
Every session last week overlapped the prior Friday’s range. And all but one of those sessions printed a fresh high. This is not basing, at least not basing capable of launching a durable rally. But a resumption of the decline at this stage requires either failing a brief probe of more fresh highs into the low 1080‘s, or gapping down under Friday’s 1060.00 low.

Bias parameters are available for Sunday night’s Globex session. New parameters will be published after its close Monday. I’ll update the Globex action in between.[/pay]

Look for at least one update overnight or ahead of the Morning Market Tour… My thoughts on the day’s econ calendar are linked here.