comment: Huge gap down on Globex open and market just sold off. We retraced about 50% and now it’s decision time again. Bears need to keep it below 21500 for a retest of 21000 or lower and bulls want the megaphone to continue and squeeze the shorts to death. Above 21500 no bear can hold short and we will most likely see acceleration upwards. I favor the bears if we stay below the 1h 20ema. For now we are in a trading range 21100 - 21400 until clearly broken.
current market cycle: trading range
key levels: 20000 - 22200
bull case: Bulls prevented a bloodbath and had a nasty reversal from 20763 for a 600 point bounce. They need a strong 1h close above 21350 if they want higher prices.
Invalidation is below 21100.
bear case: Bears need to keep it below 21500 or more bulls will join the party again. The longer we can keep the big gap from 21908 down to 21400ish open, the better for the bears and more bulls will give up, hoping for 22000 again. The low of last week was 21370 and the bounce got up to 21395. Close is always close enough. Bears remain in control of the market until we see a big 1h close above the 20ema and 21400. For now this is just a two-legged pull-back to the ema, so bears really need to defend this and not fumble a great setup again.
Invalidation is above 21500.
short term: Bearish against the 1h 20ema, which is around the 50% retracement. 21000 will get retested and maybe the lows as well.
medium-long term - Update from 2024-01-27: High’s are most likely in. Any short with stop 22200 is good. I’d like to see 20000 over the next 2-3 weeks.
current swing trade: None
trade of the day: Shorting anywhere above 21500 or buying below 20900 during the big spike down from 21140 to 20763. The spike down came after nasdaq had already made a 700+ point down move and those spikes are most likely the intermediate bottom and we see a pullback because bears needed to reduce risk and take some of those windfall profits.