S&P 500 7,357.49 -1.9% wk | Nasdaq 100 29,440.32 -3.2% wk | Dow 51,920.62 +0.7% wk | 10-Yr 4.39% PCE in line | WTI $71.47 soft |
A semiconductor selloff cracked the high flyers, and the Dow was the index that held its line.
Sunday’s Index Rank put the Nasdaq 100 at the top of the board and leaned up across all three indexes, naming the S&P 500’s 7,477 gamma flip, the level where dealer hedging stops cushioning the tape and starts amplifying it, as the line that would decide the week. That line broke Monday. A semiconductor-led selloff pulled the high flyers lower, Micron and the megacaps came in, and the S&P 500 closed at 7,472.79, just under the flip. The Nasdaq 100 then fell 3.3 percent Tuesday to 29,347 as a Bank of America rate-hike note, the morning’s S&P Global Flash PMIs, and a global tech rout deepened the move.
The Dow was the standout. It held every daily close above its 51,393 line and pushed to a fresh weekly high near 52,656 on Thursday, closing the week green while the megacaps unwound. This was rotation, not liquidation: the Russell 2000 small-cap index closed above 3,000 for the first time ever on Monday, the bid simply moved. Thursday’s Core PCE landed in line and the ten-year barely moved, so the Fed was not the story this week. The semiconductor unwind was, and the Dow stood apart from it.
The Read
Sunday ranked the Nasdaq 100 first and leaned up across the board. The Dow held its line and closed the week green at a fresh high, and the Sunday Read’s call on the S&P 500’s 7,477 flip proved exactly right: the market lost that level Monday and the structure that was supposed to cushion the tape stopped cushioning it. A semiconductor selloff did the rest. Levels first, narrative second.
The call I keep coming back to is the one on an index that missed. Sunday named the S&P 500’s 7,477 flip as the swing factor, the single line that would decide the tape, and the market lost it on the first day. When the swing level goes early, the up bias is already on notice. Levels first, narrative second, and this week the level did its job.
The Dow is the call that landed and the tell worth carrying forward. It held its line and closed green while tech broke, which says rotation, not top. I want to see whether the small caps and the Dow keep the bid, or whether the semiconductor unwind eventually drags the whole tape back to it. Next rank posts Sunday. JT
JT Smith
Founder | Steady Edge Trading
steadyedgetrading.com
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Sunday Index Rank — How It Played Out
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The Dow held its line and closed green. The Nasdaq 100 and the S&P 500 lost their invalidation levels in the tech selloff. Scored Monday through Thursday.
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| The rank scores every week, win or lose. Green when the call lands, red when it misses. These are the receipts. |
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