Thursday 04/01/2010 - E-Mini S&P 500 Futures Review/Analysis

E-Mini S&P 500 Futures
Some nice action in the S&Ps today. As I mentioned in yesterday's review, we've observed Responsive Buying and Responsive Selling all week, and today was much of the same. Responsive Sellers quickly rejected higher prices, and once price moved below 1167, Responsive Buyers quickly pushed price back up. 1167-1169 was the Area of heavy acceptance this week. This up move is losing momentum though. The previous week's high was 1176.50, and the high for this week so far is only one handle higher at 1177.50. If price gets below 1158, and longs begin liquidating, we could easily get a pullback to the 1139-1141 area.

Btw, I've received questions regarding the arrows on the 5-Minute charts I post in the daily reviews. To clarify, the arrows are NOT plotted automatically. I manually place those arrows on the charts where I see good setups (a lot of times within the Key Areas posted the night before). Some of the arrows are actual trades that I took (e.g. I shorted 1177 and went long at 1167 today). But not all of them are my trades. I don't plot all my trades on the 5-minute chart; just the setups. Hope that clears things up.

The markets are closed tomorrow for Good Friday, so enjoy the day off and have a good weekend!

ES 5-Minute Chart


ES Day Session Volume Profile Chart

Thursday 04/01/2010 - E-Mini S&P 500 Futures Key Support/Resistance Levels

E-Mini S&P 500 Futures
The current range for the WEEK is 12.50 points (1161.25-1173.75)! We've built acceptance between 1167.75 and 1169.75, and every move above and below that area has been met with Responsive Buying and Responsive Selling. We need a catalyst to drive this market outside of this range, at which point, I would anticipate some Initiative Activity. Tomorrow could be a trend day when price finally pushes to 1150 or 1183...or we could just get more of the same (chop). When everyone gets complacent (comfortable) within the current range, we'll probably get a surprise move that will force one party (either buyers or sellers) to liquidate their positions. As long as we hold above 1163, my bias remains (cautiously) to the upside. Trade well!

Econ Data
Motor Vehicle Sales, Jobless Claims at 7:30 AM (CT), Construction Spending and ISM Mfg Index at 9:00 AM (CT), EIA Natural Gas Report at 9:30 AM (CT).

ES - Daily Chart with Volume Profile and Key Levels

Tuesday 03/02/2010 - E-Mini S&P 500 Futures Review/Analysis

E-Mini S&P 500 Futures Review/Analysis
Although I didn't expect ES to tag the Range Extension Area (1122-1123), overall the game plan of Shorting into pops worked fine. ES facilitated trade above 1119 for most of the day, and we got a failed breakout attempt at the overnight high, followed by a move back to the first hour low. 1114.75-1116 is a Low Volume Node (LVN). We may get a quick rejection, or a quick move through that area. The analogy used to describe Low Vole Areas in the book, Mind Over Markets, is of a golf ball hitting a glass window: it either bounces away quickly, or breaks the window and goes right through it. 1112.50 is Support below the LVN.

ES 5-Minute Chart


ES 30-Min Volume Profile Chart


ES Day Session Volume Profile Chart

Tuesday 03/02/2010 - S&P 500 Futures Key Support/Resistance Levels

E-Mini S&P 500 Futures
I'm anticipating a range-bound rotational day, with minor upside movement tomorrow. My current plan is to short the pops at the Resistance Areas above. There's a high probability of an inside day, and I'm expecting the 1103.50 Level to hold. The 1103.50 level is also my Bull/Bear Line in the Sand to establish bias (bullish above, bearish below). The upside target on a break above 1115.50 is 1119.75. Trade well!

Econ Data
Motor Vehicle Sales (pre-market), Redbook at 7:55 AM (cst),

ES - Daily Chart with Volume Profile and Key Levels

Friday 05/01/09 - Positive Day

I only traded for a couple of hours today (10:30 AM - 12:30 PM central) since I was at the condo in the morning, and busy with other errands in the afternoon, and although today's P&L reads +$212.50, I'm much more satisfied with my trading today (grade of B-) compared to yesterday's +$1,100 gain, which I graded as a C-. My discipline was better today, although there's still room for a ton of improvement. You can check the Trade Chart to get an idea of my primary trades for the day, but basically, scalped long at a support level; scalped short at trend-line resistance, and then scalped long again once trend-continuation was confirmed, and exited on the stop-run that ensued once ES broke to a new high of day. That's it...pretty simple and straight forward trades today.

ES 610-Tick bar Chart (Trades)


My bias continues to be to the upside. At this point, if ES breaks below 850, bias switches to neutral. A break below 830 and the bears are back in control. That's all for today folks! Have a nice weekend :)

ES/$TICK (3-Min) - Gap filled within the first 20 minutes of market open. Over 100,000 contracts traded at the close with an 8 point up-move; I'm guessing that was mostly Shorts covering their position.


ES 60-Min - Bounce off the 50% retracement; Close above the 23.6%. Lookin good for the Bulls