US Markets Mid-Session Update The NQ futures alarm went off at...

US Markets Mid-Session Update

The NQ futures alarm went off at about 04:00 ET – Nasdaq futures were weaker than their counterparts, down twice as much as S&P futures in electronic trade. That coincided with downward moves in USD, oil and some metals. While those moves were relatively small, they were and remain rather synchronized with the ES – especially USD index. Gold is bucking the trend.

The reasons being given for today’s action include the upcoming Fed statement, trade wars, FB or even the overall technical failure in the NDX. Imo, it’s about the broader issue that encompasses it all: the tenuous sanity in D.C. and the dangerous geopolitical instability that it portends. But that possibility seems all but ignored by the financial media at mid-day. There is always a chance a contrived message from Washington about trade or something else could offer symptomatic relief and allow the bears a break; but there is an even better chance that continued denial of the root causes will offer interesting trades in the coming weeks and months.

The IT sector is leading the declines with the NQ futures down about 3% as of this note. The Dow has given up its yearly gains.

VIX is up substantially +37% but at a resistance point as the S&P plays with 2700 support as bulls consider this a bounce area.

SPX/ES/SPY: 2798/2701/269.00
SPX broke 2740 without much struggle and 2700 was the next area of substantial support. If 2700 is violated on heavily negative breadth today, then things could get a little dicey because there is not much derivatives support until 2660/70 just below the 100 day moving average.

Market Internals
Advance-Decline Lines: Low of -2140. NYSE Breadth: -9.05:1, NASDAQ Breadth: -6.05:1. NYSE TICK: Quite depressed since the open, trending solidly negative. TRIN: 1.32

Implied Volatility
VXH8:19.60, VXJ8: 18.45, VIX: 21.52

Debt/Bond/Treasury
ZNM8 was down considerably in early going with the 2-Year Note yield reaching its highest level since 2008, but is now up +.10% on safe haven trade. The 10 Year yield is 2.84%.

S&P Futures