For the first time in a month, the S&P 500 index futures have established a two-day losing streak as rotation and selling broadened during Thursday’s session.
Overnight and into the premarket hours, the bulls were able to keep the index futures in the green, for the most part. Resistance was encountered in the low 5660’s, near the daily and weekly pivots, which proved to be too much for the buy-the-dippers to overcome. The regular session also commenced in green territory, and after overcoming an initial wave of sellers, the bulls went to test the daily/weekly pivot area again. In short, they failed. Miserably.
After failing to break through resistance, sellers came in full force to drive the index futures into the red. The bulls tried to put up a fight around Wednesday’s low, but were overcome by sellers once again. After breaching the psychological 5600 level, the bulls were finally able to maintain a bid in the 5590’s and started their comeback. Unfortunately, the comeback was short-lived as resistance mounted near last week’s low and sellers took back control.
During the final hour, the bears seemed to hit their limit for the day, and the index futures bottomed at 5570.25. Shortly after the bulls started their dip-buying, they were assisted by news of OpenAI being in talks with Broadcom, Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) to develop a new AI chip. Broadcom led the way in the late-day rally as buying continued in the index futures.
Once closing imbalances were in, which favored the sell-side, the bears made sure we wouldn’t see a close above 5600 before options expiration Friday. The session concluded somewhat off the lows at 5594.50, marking a decline of 44.50 handles.
Among the top components of the index, one of the few bright spots was Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ: META), and it was the biggest gainer. After news of Meta being in talks to acquire 5% of EssilorLuxottica was announced, the tech conglomerate was able to advance by $13.86 or 3.00% to close at $475.85 for the day.
That performance was nearly four percent better than the cash index’s decline of 0.77%.
The biggest loser by a decent margin was Eli Lilly And Co (NYSE: LLY). Positive results for a competing weight-loss drug had investors in Eli Lilly heading for the exit. For the day, the healthcare company trimmed its fat to the tune of $56.69 or 6.26% to close at $848.90.
