The propensity for the S&P 500 index futures finishing the week on the highs or lows has returned once again after the bulls made new all-time highs during Friday’s session.
Overnight, the bears put a lid on an attempted rally, and made their way to test Thursday’s low. Support held strong above that level and the bulls brought the index futures back up near unchanged before the Producer Price Index (PPI) report came out at 8:30am EDT as follows:
| September Report | Actual | Expected | Previous |
| PPI (MoM) | 0.0% | 0.1% | 0.2% |
| PPI (YoY) | 1.8% | – | 1.9% |
| Core PPI (MoM) | 0.0% | 0.2% | 0.2% |
| Core PPI (YoY) | 3.2% | – | 3.3% |
Though there was an initial pop from the news, the initial gains were short-lived, making for a red open of the regular session. The bulls weren’t ready to give up as they quickly initiated a rally off the opening bell. Once they broke through previous all-time highs, the pace of the rally accelerated.
Once the index reached the 5860’s, bears and profit-takers put a swift end to the smooth rally, turning the action into chop. Over the lunch hour, bears tested support at the previous all-time high, which held nearly perfectly to the handle. From there, buyers were able to slowly make their way back up to make new intraday/all-time highs (5868.25) in the final hour.
The session concluded somewhat near the new all-time high, gaining 30.75 handles to mark a new all-time closing high of 5859.75. For the week, that makes for a gain of 59.75 handles or 1.03%.
Kicking off bank earnings, JPMorgan Chase & Co (NYSE: JPM) emerged as the biggest gainer among top components of the index. In addition to top and bottom-line beats, the company also raised net income guidance for FY24. Investors bought up the banking behemoth, helping it to advance by $9.45 or 4.44% to close at $222.29 for the day.
That performance was a magnificent seven times better than the cash index’s advance of 0.60%.
By far the biggest loser was Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) after traders and investors headed for the exit following their Robotaxi event Thursday evening. For the day, the EV maker declined by $20.97 or 8.78% to close at $217.80.
