The good news is that the S&P 500 index futures established a four-day win streak in Tuesday’s session. The not-so-good news is that the bears are getting more aggressive.
For much of the premarket session, the bulls were able to keep the index futures trading in the green, especially leading up to the regular session open. Off the hop, there was only chop as the bulls and bears battled it out in the 5210’s. After the first hour of the regular session, the bulls were finally able to get a leg up on the bears, where the index futures continued to chop in and around the 5220’s as Minneapolis Fed President Kashkari began his speech.
Once Kashkari took a more hawkish tone, indicating that [the Fed] should not change rates if inflation stays moving sideways and the labor market stays strong, the bears took advantage and started selling. The index futures swiftly gave up the intraday gains and continued lower. Once reaching unchanged, the bulls started to step in, only letting the index dip into the red for a moment. The bulls had their work cut out for them, as they continued to defend Monday’s closing area, and started to gain some ground in the final hour.
The last 15 minutes of the regular session had the bulls and bears battling it out once closing imbalances were in, with the bulls trying for a last-minute rally. Unable to hold onto the late-day gains, the regular session concluded at 5213.75, notching a 7.25-handle gain.
Among the top components of the index, Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOGL) emerged as the biggest gainer. The issue was able to advance by $3.15 or 1.87% to close at $171.25 for the day.
That performance was over 17 times the cash index’s small advance of 0.11%.
The biggest loser ended up being Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) after reports of a four day pause in production in Germany. For the day, the EV enterprise declined by $6.95 or 3.76% to close at $177.81.