Investing.com’s stocks of the week
What’s been happening is, the Asian and European markets push higher overnight, and the ES goes for the ride. It really seems that if you want to trade the S&P 500 futures, you have watch the the globex shift, because when the futures move overnight, it uses up most of the early morning trade.
Friday morning the S&P 500 futures (ESZ17:CME) gapped up to the 2602.00 level, traded up to a new all-time contract high at 2602.50, and then pulled back down to 2599.25, one tick under the vwap, at 9:33. The next move was up to 2602.75 at 10:22, and then up to the 2603.00 objective I have been talking about for the last month. On the 12:00 cash close the ES traded 2601.50. Volume was pitiful, only 380,000 contracts traded. After a small pullback, the ES traded back up to 2602.75 and then sold off a few ticks before closing at 2601.50, + 4.5 handles.
The ES marked its first close above 2600.00, its second-fastest run to a round-number milestone on record. The S&P took 49 days to go from 2500 to 2600, a climb whose speed was exceeded only by the 35-day surge from 1000 to 1100 in 1998.
The S&P 500 has already had a strong year, up 16%. On Friday, it made its 55th closing high, its most records in a calendar year in more than two decades. The Nasdaq has also posted the most record closes in a single year, notching its 69th on Friday, while the Dow industrials have hit 60 highs.
In the end, there was a very low level of participation, and volume was scarce. At the end of Friday’s half day session, S&P 500 futures (ESZ17:CME) settled at 2601.00, up +6.5 handles, or +0.24%; the Dow Jones futures (YMZ17:CBT) settled at 23,517, up +32 points, or +0.13%; the Nasdaq 100 futures (NQZ17:CME) settled at 6414.50, up +24 points, or +0.37%; and the Russell 2000 (RTYZ17:CME) settled at 1518.50, up +1.90 points or +0.12% on the day.
As always, please use protective buy and sell stops when trading futures and options.