Category: Market News, Research & Commentary

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF fell -2.28% last week, while the VIX closed at 21.77 at the end of Friday’s session, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.37% & a one month move of +/-6.29%.

Their RSI has bounced back above the oversold 30 level after Friday’s advancing session & sits currently at 37.73, while their MACD is still bearish but has flattened out & is moving towards the signal line.

Volumes were +48.21% above the previous year’s average level (78,752,000 vs. 53,134,498), as for the second straight week sellers have snapped the weak volume of the past year.

Week-over-week volume declined -4.28%, but that isn’t reason to start celebrating just yet (last week’s note).

Monday kicked the week off on a bearish note, as a gap down open below the 200 day moving average was unable to break back above its resistance on the week’s highest volume session.

While the decline was unable to break down the $555/share mark, it showed that there was plenty of interest for prices to be pushed down to test it later in the week.

Tuesday saw the declines continue with another gap lower on the open on a high wave candle that temporarily broke down below the $555/share mark, while also attempting to test but falling short of the $565/share level.

Wednesday the sellers took a short breather & the day resulted in an advancing session, however it should be noted that the session began on a gap up, before breaking down below the $555/share price level & recovering to close below its opening price at $558.87/share.

Wednesday’s volume would be the second lowest of the week, which is important to note as the only day with less volume was Friday, the other advancing session of the week.

Thursday opened on another gap lower, before testing all the way down to below the $550/share price level, but was able to close above the session’s low of $549.68/share.

Friday the week wound down on a positive note, but under the hood there was still signs of trouble.

Firstly, the ten day moving average bearishly crossed through the 200 DMA & secondly the volume of the session in relation to the day’s wide trading range were also cause for concern.

Friday’s session managed to advance +2.07%, which brought the total declines of the week up to -2.28%, which does not inspire much confidence.

For the week ahead, any upside movement will require strong volume with it in order to prove sustainable & inspire confidence to the upside, especially given how steep the declines of the past month have been.

Historically SPY’s next two resistance levels occur in a Seller dominated price zone (1.59:1), which will make it even more imperative to have strong upside volume in the near-term to see any advances that are sustainable.

There’s a chance of a consolidation range within the body of Friday’s candle as we head towards Wednesday’s FOMC Interest Rate announcement, which would provide some seller volume in the price zone that currently is Buyers 1.8:0*

Should we get that consolidation & lackluster advancing volume the $549.68/share price level will be a key place to keep your eyes on, as it’s currently the support level that was most recently hit in the past week.

It also resides in a Seller zone, indicating that if it gets retested & broken through that there will be further declines on the horizon, as the next support level lives -2.49% below it & also happens to be within a Seller zone, along with the next lowest support level at $534.01.

If these break down the next support level is -2.7% lower at $519.58/share.

SPY has support at the $561.54 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.8:0*), $560.59 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.8:0*), $551.32 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.25:1) & $549.68/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.06:1) price levels, with resistance at the $565.99 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.59:1), $568.19 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.59:1), $570.38 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5.33:1) & $575.35/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.08:1) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF dropped -2.47% as investors fled the tech heavy index for a second consecutive week.

Their RSI has also just crossed back above the oversold 30 level & sits at 37.76, while their MACD is also bearish, but has flattened out & is moving towards the signal line.

Volumes were +60.5% above the prior year’s average level (56,504,000 vs. 35,204,137), and were +5.17% above last week’s QQQ volume, which should be approached with caution in the coming week.

QQQ’s week resembled SPY’s, as it kicked off with a gap lower on the week’s highest volume on Monday, with the $470/share level temporarily broken down through intraday.

Tuesday opened on a gap lower & resulted in a high wave candle that broke down through the $470/share level to the downside, and fell just short of the $480/share level to the upside, closing the day as a spinning top candle.

This symbol of uncertainty combined with the week’s second highest volume on a declining session is not reason to inspire confidence in the near-term.

Wednesday saw a gap up open that briefly crossed above the $480/share level, but that quickly deflated to dip beneath the $475/share price level before finally closing lower than it opened at $476.92.

While volumes were still eclipsing the rest of 2025’s levels, Wednesday & onward was very tame for QQQ compared to Monday & Tuesday.

Thursday the declines continued, as the day opened with a gap down & the declines continued to below the $470/share mark.

Friday offered a +2.42% advance, helping trim the week’s total losses to -2.47%.

Much like SPY, the only way that there will be a sustainable recovery to the upside for QQQ will require there to be a major increase in advancing volume & any up days that don’t show that should be viewed with a suspicious eye.

This is especially true given that Friday’s closing price falls in a Seller dominated zone at a ratio of 1.52:1, so an increase in volume will be needed to trump historic Seller senitment.

This week there will likely be a consolidation within the price range of the latter portion of last week, as the 10 day moving average catches up to QQQ’s price, which may then lead to oscillation around the short-term trend line.

The downside case for QQQ is not a particularly rosy picture, as while there has been plenty of Buyer support at their next three support levels, they’ve also been relatively untested & the fourth support level requires a -6.6%+ drop before it can be tested, where it enjoys a Seller:Buyer ratio of 1.4:1.

Should this occur, it will be time to focus on the $441.02/share support level, where Buyers have historically been victorious at a clip of 4.22:1.

QQQ has support at the $474.12 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.52:1), $466.43 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:0*), $458.47 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.89:1) & $447.28/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.4:1) price levels, with resistance at the $484.08 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.88:1), $484.39 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.88:1), $492.40 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.13:1) & $493.69/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.13:1) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF shed only -1.49% last week, as the small cap index outperformed the rest of the pack after three months of steady declines.

Their RSI has also just peeked its head back up above the oversold 30 mark & is currently at 34.53, while their MACD is bearish, but moving towards the signal line following the range of the past week that IWM stayed within.

Volumes were +33.63% above the previous year’s average level (38,652,000 vs. 28,924,779), which doesn’t inspire much confidence, given that Friday’s +2.42% session brought the total week’s losses to -1.49%.

Monday kicked the week off on a gap down for IWM on the week’s second highest volume of the week, where the upper shadow of the day’s candle couldn’t break above the $205/share level, while the lower range of the day indicated that there was appetite below the $200/share level.

Tuesday also did not inspire confidence for IWM, as the week’s highest volume session resulted in a high wave spinning top candle, where the day’s high did not break above Monday’s opening price & the day’s low almost matched Monday’s low, all the while the day closed as a declining day.

Wednesday opened on a gap up, before retreating to temporarily trade below $200/share & ultimately closed lower than it opened, indicating that there was still a lot of negative sentiment in the market for the small cap index.

Thursday provided the week’s weakest volume, but also provided the local downside support level at $197/share based on the day’s low, while Friday managed to close out the day for an advancing session.

The coming week will be interesting for IWM, as any type of advance will require an uptick in volume to be taken seriously & should be viewed skeptically if there is no volume improvement.

We will likely see some form of consolidation heading into mid-week, where the $197 support level gets retested & price oscillates around the 10 day moving average until we get a greater catalyst to the upside or downside.

As for downside risks, IWM currently only has 5 support levels below Friday’s closing price on their one year chart, the lowest of which is $189.60/share.

What makes this significant is that the current support zone beneath IWM’s Friday close are the only 2 Buyer dominated zones that occur before historic Seller volume leads prices towards that retest.

The table below will be important to review in the coming weeks with regards to IWM’s price movement.

IWM has support at the $197.34 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $197 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $196.15 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1) & $195.45/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.15:1) price levels, with resistance at the $202.91 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.54:1), $203.85 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.54:1), $205.95 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.21:1) & $207.86/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.21:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF declined -3.01% last week, faring the worst of the major index ETFs as investors dumped names in the blue chip index.

Their RSI has just came back from oversold territory & sits at 36.2, while their MACD is still bearish, but has flattened & may approach the signal line in the coming week.

Volumes were -5.56% lower than the previous year’s average (3,054,000 vs. 3,233,896), bucking the trend of higher volumes, despite losing the most on the week out of the major index ETFs.

While DIA has been the most resilient of the major index ETFs, the blue chip names have begun to show cracks as their long-term trend line broke down last week.

Monday DIA opened on a gap down, where the day’s high occurred above $425/share, but the day’s low went down to test the support of the 200 day moving average.

Tuesday the negative sentiment continued, as the highest volume session of the week opened on a gap lower & broke through the 200 DMA’s support & continued lower, closing below the $515/share mark.

Wednesday this trend continued, as DIA opened in-line with the 200 DMA, tried to poke its head out higher, but was rejected & broke down to approach the $410/share level & closed lower on the day.

Thursday opened on another gap down for the third of the week & declined all the way down to the new $407.25/share support level before recovering a little bit & closing at $413.95.

Friday’s +1.61% advance cut DIA’s weekly losses to -3.01%, indicating that there is still quite a bit of bearish sentiment in the markets right now.

Much like the aforementioned three indexes, DIA will require a spike in advancing volume in order to recover from the past few weeks in a sustainable manner.

They’re also in a unique position, in that their current price level is in a price zone where buyers & sellers have met at a ratio of 1:1 in the last 4-5 years, but their next two resistance levels occur in a zone that has gone to the sellers at a rate of 1.1:1.

With the 10 day moving average fast approaching the 200 DMA there is still some downside pressure on DIA’s price, but it seems likely that there will be at least a short-term consolidation that oscillates between the $407.25/share mark & the 200 day moving average.

Another area of worry for DIA is in the event that their prices do break down, as the $408-411.99/share zone has seen limited downside volume & that ratio will likely be diluted further down from 12:1.

Should it break down & the $407.25/share support level can’t hold up, there isn’t a local support level until $397.35/share, which is -2.43% lower & enters another relatively overly bullish ratio zone.

The table below will be valuable in the coming week(s) to gain insight into DIA’s potential price movements based on historic volume data.

DIA has support at the $414.21 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1), $412.95 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1), $409.76 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 12:1) & $408.12/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 12:1) price levels, with resistance at the $417.39 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.11:1), $417.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.11:1), $420.93 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.5:1) & $421.46/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.5:1) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday the week kicks off with U.S. Retail Sales, Retail Sales minus Autos & Empire State Manufacturing Survey data at 8:30 am, followed by Business Inventories & Home Builder Confidence Index data at 10 am.

Science Applications & Textron report earnings before Monday’s opening bell, with Getty Images & Open Lending scheduled to report after the session’s close.

Housing Starts, Building Permits, Import Price Index & Import Price Index minus Fuel data are all released at 8:30 am, before Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization data is released at 9:15 am.

Tuesday morning’s earnings calls include HUYA, KE Holdings & Tencent Music, followed by Maravai LifeSciences & ZTO Express after the closing bell.

Wednesday afternoon features the FOMC Interest-Rate Decision at 2pm & Fed Chair Powell’s Press Conference at 2:30 pm.

General Mills, Kingsoft Cloud, Ollie’s Bargain Outlet, Signet Jewelers & Sportradar Group report Wednesday morning before the session opens, followed by Super Micro Computer, Five Below & Worthington Steel after the session’s close.

Initial Jobless Claims & Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Survey data are released Thursday morning at 8:30 am, followed by Existing Home Sales & U.S. Leading Economic Indicators data at 10 am.

Thursday morning’s earnings calls include Academy Sports + Outdoors, Commercial Metals, Darden Restaurants, Designer Brands, FactSet, Jabil, Shoe Carnival & ZEEKR Intelligent, with FedEx, Lennar, KinderCare Learning Companies, Luminar Technologies, Micron, NIKE & Torrid reporting after the closing bell.

Friday features no major economic data announcements & NIO & Carnival will report earnings before the opening bell.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF fell -3.07% last week, while the VIX closed out at 23.37, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.47% & an implied one month move of +/-6.75%.

Their RSI is currently at 37.02, while their MACD is still in bearish decline, which will make for an interest week as their 200 day moving average is just -1.11% below Friday’s closing price.

Volumes were +54.34% above the previous year’s average level (82,276,000 vs. 53,307,400), indicating that there is a bit of nervous energy & bearishness as people are jumping out of the pool in droves.

It’s worth noting that on 3/17/2024 SPY’s prior year’s average volume was 78,989,814, so this week’s average volume for the prior year eclipses that by +4.16%, which is an incredibly bearish signal given how the current average prior year’s volume for this week is -32.51% lower than from 51-weeks ago (note here).

Monday the week kicked off with a rather bearish set up, as SPY opened higher, tested the 10 & 50 day moving average’s resistance, which were crossing over bearishly, before dropping to form a bearish engulfing pattern with Friday’s candle, setting the stage for further declines into the week.

Tuesday opened on a gap down, tested higher to above Monday’s close, before puking lower to close the day red & based on the high wave candle’s lower shadow exposed a good deal of downside appetite, breaking below the $575/share mark.

There was a large tug of war going on that day, as the session had the week’s & 2025’s highest volume to date, but in the end the bears won.

Wednesday opened lower & again broke the $575/share mark temporarily, but was able to claw back higher to temporarily break above the $585/share mark, which proved unsustainable, but the session ended as a bullish engulfing pattern.

It’s worth noting that this came on the week’s lowest volume, which indicated that there was limited staying power & that it was likely just a head-fake to lure folks back into the markets after all of the selling of the prior 2-3 weeks.

Thursday opened on a gap lower, tested above the $580/share mark, but proved that the ship was still sinking as it proved unsustainable & the declines continued, briefly flirting with the support of the 200 day moving average, but recovering slightly to still close on a down day on the week’s third highest volume, signaling that the bulls were nowhere to be found.

Friday the week wound down on a bullish engulfing candle with the week’s second highest volume, but it again looked to be a head-fake, as the long-term trend line was broken through to the downside & the $565/share mark was approached, but not tested.

Per last week’s note, we saw the $575.35/share support line temporarily break down, which set the stage for the aforementioned trend test & the fact that it succeeded briefly indicates that there is questionable-to-shattered confidence in the market currently.

Another area of note is that the $570-574.99/share zone has been dominated by Buyers at a rate of 5.33:1 over the past ~2-3 years & yet the bulls were unable to defend the zone & it broke down temporarily.

As I am writing this (Monday morning as I was just OOO last week) the declines have continued per the open, and the high of the first 32 minutes of trading has not been able to break above the 200 DMA’s resistance.

The $565-$569.99/share zone has been dominated by Sellers at a rate of 1.59:1 in recent history, indicating that without some strong earnings results or a miracle from Wednesday’s CPI print or Thursday’s PPI print we will likely see further declines.

This is especially true given that the $560-564.99/share zone has seen limited downside tests & has been a Buyer zone at a rate of 1.8:0* & there has been a bit of momentum to the downside building up over the past few weeks.

The bullish case rests on SPY being able to break above the 200 DMA’s resistance & the $575.35/share mark, which will require a major catalyst & a large influx in advancing volume if it is to be sustainable, as currently there is a rather pessimistic outlook from the volume sentiment of SPY.

What is more likely to happen is that we either see a consolidation range established based around today’s close that will straddle & oscillate around the 200 DMA, or we see further breakdowns until their RSI crosses into oversold territory & a brief consolidation range forms as sellers take a breather.

Should that $560/share zone break down SPY will see a bit more trouble brewing, as despite there being 3.44:1 Buyers:Sellers for the $560.59/share support level, that breakdown leads to an elevator ride down with only one stop at $551.32/share to $535.99/share (an additional -2.78% decline) based on a lack of support levels in between, paired with weak Buyer sentiment along the way down.

The table below highlights the volume sentiments for SPY over the past ~2-3 years & is useful for assessing the strength/weakness of support/resistance levels in the coming weeks as they’re tested.

SPY has support at the $575.35 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers 1.08:1), $569.54 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.59:1), $565.99 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.59:1) & $561.54/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.8:0*) price levels, with resistance at the $580.91 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1), $585.75 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.55:1) & $590.49/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF dropped -3.22% last week, as the tech-heavy index fell out of favor among investors as well.

Their RSI is just above the oversold 30-mark & sits currently at 35.65, while their MACD is still in bearish decline with a histogram that isn’t painting a picture of it changing in the near-term.

Volumes were +52.34% above the prior year’s average level (53,728,000 vs. 35,269,360), which when compared to last year’s average level paints a similar eerie picture as SPY’s, given that this year’s average prior year’s volume is -29.86% lower than a year ago’s level of 50,281,257.

Monday opened similarly to SPY, as QQQ set a bearish engulfing pattern on Friday’s candle, with the $495/share mark being temporarily broken through to the downside.

Tuesday continued the bearish theme, as QQQ opened on a gap down, broke down through the 200 DMA’s support briefly, continued lower to break down the $490/share price level, before climbing back to close above it’s open, but still lower than Monday’s close.

The high wave candle also showed some temporary upside appetite too, but in the end the week’s highest volume session went to the bears after a long tug-of-war.

Wednesday opened on a gap up, but not without testing lower down to the 200 DMA’s support, but QQQ managed to bounce north from it to close above the $500/share mark.

It’s worth noting that this occurred on the week’s second lowest volume, so the upside move lacked strength behind it.

QQQ opened Thursday on a gap lower, briefly attempting to break higher above the $495/share mark, but did not reach the $450 level, and came crashing down below the 200 day moving average’s support to close below the $490/share level.

Thursday’s lower shadow also signaled that the $485/share level became in play & the week’s second highest volume session painted a dismal picture for the coming week.

Friday opened on a gap lower, broke down below the $485/share level & almost reached the $480/share mark, before rallying higher to briefly break above the 200 DMA’s resistance & closed the week out just below the long-term trend line.

Like SPY, there will need to be a significant shift in advancing volume in order for any upside near-term moves to be sustainable & as such all should be viewed skeptically in the coming week(s).

In the event of a consolidation range forming, it will likely oscillate around the 200 DMA once the long-term trendline & QQQ’s price meet again, but per Monday’s open there were further declines away from the slow moving average.

An area of concern for QQQ which can be seen in the table below is that their next four support levels from Friday’s close extend to declines of ~-9% in terms where their fourth support level to find footing on occurs & there is a lot of Seller pressure along the way there, lumped in with only one strong Buyer pressure zone ($452-455.99/share @ a rate of 2.5:1).

Any downside movements are worth referencing against the table below to see where there may be relief, but with so few local support levels QQQ looks ready for a difficult week(s) ahead in the near-term.

QQQ has support at the $484.08 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.88:1), $474.12 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.52:1), $458.47 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.89:1) & $447.28/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.4:1) price levels, with resistance at the $491.89 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.57:1), $493.69 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.13:1), $499.70 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2:0*) & $502/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 3.22:1) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF declined -4.05%, as the small cap index took the brunt of the week’s beatings in terms of the major index ETFs.

Their RSI is in oversold territory, sitting at 29.59, while their MACD is bearish with a steady histogram reading, which doesn’t signal that there is an immediate recovery on the horizon.

Volumes were +44.59% above the previous year’s average levels (41,838,000 vs. 28,934,640), which should sound alarm bells given that IWM’s current previous year’s average volume is -16.67% lower than that level one year ago (34,724,721).

IWM’s week opened on a bearish engulfing candle as well, after they’d already broken down through their 200 day moving average’s support the week prior & the resistance of the 10 DMA was unable to be tested despite the gap up opening price level.

Tuesday opened on a gap down, tested lower to break down through the $205/share level to the downside, but heavy volume pushed IWM higher to flirt with the $210/share mark, before closing above its opening price, but still lower on the day.

Tuesday’s high wave doji candle showed that while there was some uncertainty surrounding where IWM was to be valued, it was definitively viewed as lower given the candle’s real body & the highest volume of the week showed that despite the tug-of-war, there was conviction that it certainly belonged lower.

Wednesday opened on a gap higher, tested lower to <$205/share mark, but ultimately was able to break out & close above the $207/share level; it should be noted that this occurred on weak volume, indicating that there was limited strength behind the move higher & that it should be viewed skeptically.

Thursday confirmed this, as IWM opened on a gap lower & closed the day as a high wave doji that signaled that there was some appetite to above $207/share still, but sellers came out to force the session below $205/share briefly before it settled down for the day just above that level.

Friday resulted in the week’s second highest volume on another high wave candle, but the high was unable to reach the $207/share level & the low broke down below the $202/share mark.

While the day resulted in a bearish engulfing candle, the lower shadow speaks volumes about investor sentiment towards IWM in the near-term & it’s a bleak outlook.

The bullish case for IWM revolves around their RSI being in oversold territory & a brief bounce, but like with SPY & QQQ, without a meaningful increase in consistent advancing volume there’s little reason to believe any such move will be sustainable.

Any upward movement would also likely be thwarted by the 10 day moving average’s resistance, as it bears down on IWM’s price.

The more neutral look at IWM would be for a consolidation range to form around Friday/today’s price ranges that would likely oscillate around their 10 day moving average, but given that this is the small cap index this would only happen as a result of a temporary breather after their past few months of declines while their RSI heads back towards the neutral level, as they will continue to be punished if their larger counterpart indexes head lower.

The $196-197.99/share zone will be a place of interest in the event of further declines for IWM, as it is the strongest level of Buyer:Seller sentiment over the past ~2-3 years (2.5:1) within -9.69% of Friday’s closing price & it houses two support levels.

Should these break down the next support level has less historic Buyer sentiment (1.15:1) before we re-enter Seller dominated zones without support levels, which will make it difficult to find stable footing on.

The following support level is $189.60, which occurs in a Buyers zone (1.64:1), which if that breaks down is the last one-year support level & prices enter a Seller dominated zone at a rate of 1.44:1, which would prove poor for IWM.

The $188/share mark is -8.72% from Friday’s close, so if prices break down through it & then slide through the next zone, the $186/share level is -9.69% from Friday’s closing level.

As with the indexes above, it is worth reviewing IWM’s price action against the table below in the coming weeks.

IWM is at a support/resistance point of $205.95 & has support at the $202.91 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.54:1), $197.34 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $196.15 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1) & $195.45/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.15:1) price levels, with resistance at the $207.86 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.64:1), $207.96 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.64:1), $209.94 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.64:1) & $210.93/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.64:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF dipped -2.31% last week, as the blue chip names still remained the most resilient of the major indexes.

Their RSI is currently at 40.99, while their MACD is bearish & its histogram is not indicating that the slide is over in the near-term.

Volumes were +4.14% above the prior year’s average (3,384,000 vs. 3,249,250), which is less troubling than the aforementioned indexes, but given that DIA is home to the blue chips this should be expected.

Their current prior year’s average volume level is -5.53% lower than DIA’s average volume level one year ago (3,439,304), so even some of the investors who value the safety of the blue chip names are beginning to head towards the exit.

Monday opened the week up on a gap higher above the 10 day moving average’s resistance, broke above the $440/share mark, before sliding below the support of both the 10 & 50 DMAs to cross below the $430/share level temporarily to close forming a bearish engulfing candle with Friday’s session.

One thing of note here was that while Monday had DIA’s widest range of the week, it also contained the highest volume, setting the stage for further declines & likely signaling a larger trend shift for the blue chip names.

Tuesday followed suit & opened on a gap lower, attempted to break above the $430/share level but was unable to remain above it for long & ultimately closed lower, with the day’s low price touching below $425/share, signaling that there was more downside interest on the horizon.

Wednesday opened on a gap lower & again the $425/share level was broken through bearishly temporarily, before DIA rallied to close above the $430/share level; however this occurred on the second lowest volume of the week, signaling that there was not much conviction behind the bullish engulfing candle, particularly given the day’s wide range of prices covered.

Thursday resulted in an interesting day for DIA, as the week’s lowest volume session resulted in a high wave doji candle for a decline, causing a bearish harami pattern, where the upper shadow tested & was rejected by the $430/share level, while the day’s low crossed below the $425/share level.

The low volume on a high wave candle does not indicate that there was much tug-of-war & as a result the taller upper shadow comes with less meaning given the result of the day’s close.

Friday threw an interesting head-fake to the upside, as the day opened on a gap lower below the $425/share level, tested & bounced off of the $421.98/share level, before advancing for the day to close+0.55% & form a bullish engulfing pattern.

While it was on the week’s second highest volume, it indicates that at best DIA will consolidate in a range between the real body of Friday’s candle.

DIA will need significant increases in advancing volume for any near-term gains to be sustainable like the other three indexes & has the resistance of the 10 day moving average bearing down on it.

In the event of a downside move the 200 DMA’s support will be a key area to watch, as it resides in a zone that Sellers have bested Buyers 1.11:1 over the past ~4-5 years & should it break down the next zone ($412-415.99/share) has been Even (1:1) between the bulls & bears in terms of volume, which will likely become advantage Sellers unless the price oscillates around the 200 DMA favoring the downside.

The $408.12/share support level will become a key area to watch should those events unfold, as the $408-411.99/share has historically been won by Buyers at a rate of 12:1, which means it has been relatively untested by Sellers.

If that level breaks down there isn’t another support level to gain footing on for another -2.64% & a Seller:Buyer 1.17:1 zone sits atop it, which will likely lead prices lower to test it.

The table below will be beneficial to reference in the coming weeks in relation to DIA’s price movements.

DIA has support at the $427.60 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.25:1), $420.93 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.5:1), $417.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.11:1) & $416.78/share (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.11:1) price levels, with resistance at the $430.88 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.5:1), $431.80 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.5:1), $432.86 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.75:1) & $435.90/share (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1) price levels.

The Week Ahead

There is no major economic data due for release on Monday.

BioNTech & Franco-Nevada report earnings Monday morning before the opening bell, followed by Asana, HighPeak Energy, Limbach Holdings, Mission Produce, Oracle, Paymentus, StandardAero & Vail Resorts after the closing bell.

Tuesday opens with NFIB Optimism Index data at 6:45 am, before Job Openings Data is released at 10 am.

Ciena, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Ferguson Enterprises, First Watch Restaurant Group, Holley, Kohl’s, Korn Ferry, Legend Biotech, United Natural Foods & Viking Holdings all report earnings before Tuesday’s opening bell, with Cadre Holdings, Casey’s General, Stitch Fix & Westrock Coffee reporting after the session’s close.

Wednesday begins with Consumer Price Index, CPI Year-over-Year, Core CPI & Core CPI Year-over-Year data at 8:30 am, followed by Monthly U.S. Federal Budget data at 2 pm.

ABM Industries, Arcos Dorados & iRobot all report earnings Wednesday before the session’s open, with Adobe, American Eagle Outfitters, Calavo Growers, Crown Castle, Phreesia, SentinelOne, Sprinklr & UiPath reporting after the closing bell.

Initial Jobless Claims come out at 8:30 am on Thursday, as well as Producer Price Index, Core PPI, PPI Year-over-Year & Core PPI Year-over-Year data.

Thursday’s earnings kick off with Dollar General, G-III Apparel & Weibo in the morning, before Ulta Beauty, Berry Petroleum, Blink Charging, DocuSign, EverCommerce, PagerDuty, Rubrik, Semtech, ServiceTitan, Wheaton Precious Metals, Xponential Fitness & Zumiez report after the session’s close.

Consumer Sentiment (prelim) March data is due for release on Friday at 10 am.

Friday’s morning’s earnings reports include Buckle, Gogo & Li Auto.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

Well, things have become interesting… the week ended relatively in-line with last week’s expectations.

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF dipped -0.96% this past week, while the VIX closed at 19.63, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.24% & an implied one month move of +/-5.67%.

Their RSI is advancing towards the neutral 50 mark & sits currently at 44.54, while their MACD is bearish, but their histogram has begun to taper off following Friday’s session.

Volumes were +18.77% above the previous year’s average level (63,054,000 vs. 53,091,315), which should be viewed as problematic given the declines of the last week that were saved by Friday’s squeeze heading into the weekend.

Monday the week kicked off on a sour note, as while SPY opened above Friday’s close it was unable to stay above the support of the 50 day moving average, closing below it to not return above the medium-term trend line for the remainder of the week.

Tuesday the declines continued, on slightly higher volume than Monday, indicating that market participants had become antsy, particularly as the $590/share price level was temporarily broken during the session.

Wednesday the declines took a breather, but there was no indication that things were going to turn around, as the day flashed many bearish signals.

The session opened in the middle of Tuesday’s range, tested higher to break above the 50 day moving average’s resistance, before cratering & settling below the open, with the sessions’s lower shadow indicating that there was still downside appetite as well.

It should be noted that the session closed as a spinning top as well, on the week’s lowest volume while forming a bearish harami pattern with Tuesday’s candle, signaling that there was a bit of anxiety in the market.

Thursday opened on a gap up just beneath the 50 day moving average’s resistance, tested higher but was unable to break above the 50 DMA & ultimately dropped to below the $585/share price level on the second highest volume of the week.

It should also be noted that this was the third highest volume of the year, trailing the previous Friday’s volume & the volume that was produced in the following day’s session.

There was clearly a bit of fear in the air.

Friday had the highest volume of 2025 on a +1.56% advancing session which saved SPY’s week in terms of final performance.

It closed with signs of uncertainty, as there was high volume & the candle formed a bullish harami pattern, which could indicate a reversal is in the making, especially given that the volume was the highest of 2025.

It may be worth taking a look to back on December 20,2025 when a similar pattern emerged in terms of both the pattern & the volume spike while SPY was below their 50 DMA.

While the next three sessions advanced, the next few weeks saw increased declines, creating the $575.35/share support level that we will be keeping an eye on over the coming weeks.

One point of difference is that there is more distance between the 10 & 50 DMAs, follow the volume trends over the coming week(s) to see if there is an increase in advancing volume levels, which will be imperative to sustain the reversal.

It currently looks like the 50 DMA will be straddled/oscillated around moving into the next week, particularly as it is -0.52% below the 10 DMA, which is ready to cross over bearishly in the next few sessions.

Should the $590.49/share support level break down, the following two support levels have been dominated by Sellers at the rate of 1.88:1 over the past ~3-4 years.

That $575.35 support level happens to be in a Buyer dominated zone, but the ratio has been only 1.08:1, which means that the long-term trend line is now in play, as the 200 DMA’s support is only -4.39% below Friday’s closing price & is the next support level.

Should there be any advances, the $600/share mark will be difficult to cross bullishly & sustain further advances based on the volume data in the table below.

SPY has support at the $590.49 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1), $580.19 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1) & $575.35/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.08:1) price levels, with resistance at the $597.86 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.47:1), $600.97 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.04:1), $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.04:1) & $607.03/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5.5:1) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF declined -3.4% last week, faring the worst of the major index ETFs.

Their RSI is advancing towards the neutral 50 level, but currently sits at 39.7, while their MACD is bearish & looks set to continue lower.

Volumes were +26.82% above the previous year’s average (44,554,000 vs. 35,131,713), which paints an even bleaker picture than was just described regarding SPY.

Much like SPY, Monday opened the week off on a sour note for QQQ, as the session broke down through the 50 day moving average’s support to close beneath it, setting the stage for a week of declines.

Volume was light, but it was the kindling that lit the fire for the rest of the week.

Tuesday opened on a gap lower, but more sellers entered the arena than Monday & forced a temporary breakdown of the $510/share price level, but prices were able to recover enough to close down, but above $510/share.

Wednesday saw a temporary breather, but much like SPY’s chart, it did not paint a picture of recovery.

The day formed a bearish harami pattern with Tuesday on a high wave spinning top, indicating a great deal of indecision, particularly as the day had the weakest volume of the week.

Thursday opened on a gap up, formed a bearish engulfing pattern on Wednesday’s candle & had the second highest volume of the year, indicating that there was a large abandoning of ship after the NVDA earnings calls which was after Wednesday’s close.

Friday did QQQ no favors either, as despite the +1.58% advance the $500/share level was blatantly broken down before the rally that pushed QQQ to close higher, and volumes were lower than Thursday’s, making it appear like a bait & switch squeeze in the wake of the major declining day.

Heading into the new week QQQ has a slightly different set up than SPY, given that their 10 DMA is set to crossover bearishly through the 50 DMA by Wednesday & the proximity of their close to their long-term trend line.

QQQ closed the week with their 200 DMA’s support just -3.44% below their closing price, which indicates that prices may venture back north to near where the 10 & 50 DMA’s are temporarily, else consolidate within the range established by Friday’s candle for the week.

The good news for bulls is that QQQ is currently in the last of three major Seller dominated price levels that were outline below (also on the table below), but the bad news is that given how fast they fell last week & at such high participation rates, that even consolidating temporarily seems tricky without some increase in volume vs. the prior year’s average.

Should prices advance & retest the 10 & 50 DMAs’ resistance levels, the December 20th mark listed above is worth revisiting to get an idea of where things may go, as well as the chart below for the volume sentiment reading.

Should the 200 DMA’s support break down, $487.99-484.00 will be the last stalwart of support, with Buyers besting Sellers at a ratio of 4.133:1 over the past ~2-3 years, else there’ll likely be a further breakdown from the $484.08/share support level.

QQQ has support at the $502.00 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 3.22:1), $499.70 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2:0*), $493.69 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.13:1) & $490.70/share (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.57:1) price levels, with resistance at the $508.47 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.54:1), $511.05 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3.13:1), $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3.13:1) & $522.09/share (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF fell -1.45% last week, as small caps held steady on volume, but were unable to finish above par.

Their RSI is advancing after bouncing off of the oversold 30 level & sits currently at 34.98, while their MACD is still bearish, but the histogram is waning after Friday’s advancing session.

Volumes were +4.82% above the previous year’s average (30,156,000 vs. 28,769,163), which while it appears irrelevant compared to SPY & QQQ does indicated that there is trouble brewing for small caps as well.

Monday set the week up for failure quickly, as the session immediately broke down the long-term trend line of support & tested the downside of $215/share, indicating that folks were hopping out of the pool.

Tuesday this continued, when the session opened & tried to test the resistance of the 200 DMA, failed & went south to close on a decline on the highest volume of the week.

Wednesday attempted a “Hail Mary” & wound up just forming a bearish harami pattern on the week’s weakest volume, but the upper shadow shows that at least for a moment, there were some buyers in the room.

IWM closed as a spinning top candle that closed lower than it opened, indicating indecision-to-negative sentiment, with the lower shadow of the day’s range breaking below $215/share, setting the stage for further losses.

This was also the week’s weakest session by volume, indicating that there was not much validity to the upwards moves of the day & that profits were taken.

Thursday produced further declines that lead to IWM being under $212.50/share, with the upper shadow of the day’s candle not signaling much upside appetite.

Friday opened on a gap lower, tested lower, before closing out as an advance of +1.06%, but the volumes tell the same story of short-term squeeze, which the 200 DMA’s resistance at 1.46% above Friday’s close will likely prove true.

IWM is currently in the $212-213.99/share price zone, which over the past ~2-3 years has been primarily dominated by the Sellers at a ratio of 1.29:1, signaling that the added resistance of the long-term trend line may add trouble for the index.

Look for the 10 & 50 Day Moving Averages to cross bearishly through the 200 DMA over the next 6 sessions, and unless we get some bullish catalyst, it looks like we’ll see some consolidation with further declines in the near-term.

Any catalyst will need sufficient levels of volume behind it to become sustainable, so this week’s levels are nothing of note, unless we see more days with higher levels of advancing volume.

The $209.94/share support level has typically been won by the Buyers at a rate of 2.64:1, which will be a key area to watch should we see any declines through the three closer support levels that are all in a Seller zone.

Reference the table below for more information on IWM’s volume sentiment by price level.

IWM has support at the $214.01 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1), $213.97 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1), $213.96 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1) & $209.94/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.64:1) price levels, with resistance at the $216.73 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, Buyers, 1.37:1), $217.79 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.37:1), $217.85 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.37:1) & $219.60/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.37:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF squeaked out an advance of +0.97%, as the blue chip index remained resilient while the other majors declined, but participation was low.

Their RSI is approaching the neutral 50-mark at 48.52, while their MACD is bearish, but has flattened out in the wake of Friday’s session.

Volumes were -4.22% lower than their prior year’s average level (3,112,000 vs. 3,249,163), bucking the trend on volume & advance/decline, but not showing much sign of life.

Monday kicked the week off in spooky-spirit, with a spinning top bearish harami pattern that had the week’s highest volume & a close that was lower than the open, but the lower shadow indicated that there was more appetite lower vs. higher.

Tuesday also gave off a lack of confidence, as DIA tested even lower, before temporarily breaking through the 50 day moving average’s resistance & closing as a spinning top, in-line with the 50 DMA.

Wednesday showed the worst volume of the week, on a session that featured a gap up, a test slightly higher than Tuesday & then a decline that was slightly above Tuesday’s low, inspiring a slight bit of optimism.

Thursday gave an indication that we may see the 10 DMA be straddled as it bearishly approaches the 50 day moving average based on its upper shadow, which also broke the day prior’s high, but that bearish day was the second highest volume day of the week.

Partially due to the wide range & likely some intra-day profit taking, but it showed that folks were willing to see the 10 DMA for a brief vacation.

Friday had the third highest volume of the week, which is troubling as it shows that the 10 DMA’s resistance is proving temporarily resilient, as it sits <1% above the 50 DMA’s support, indicating price will likely straddle the 10 & consolidate, else decline unless we see a substantial uptick in volume on some advances.

It’s also worth looking at the unfilled gaps of early 2025; DIA is the blue chip index, everyone buys into them at the end of the day for the most part for safety, this is in part why they’ve weathered the storm so well.

After a -2.37% decline, per the table below, there is a bit of room for declines based on previous volume trends, which will be key areas to keep an eye on in the coming week(s).

DIA has support at the $435.90 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.75:1), $432.86 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.75:1), $430.88 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.5:1) & $427.60/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.25:1) price levels, with resistance at the $438.80 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1), $442.49 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1), $449.41 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.6:0*) & $449.69/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.6:0*) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday the week kicks off with S&P Final U.S. Manufacturing PMI data at 9:45 am, followed by Construction Spending & ISM Manufacturing data at 10 am, Fed President Musalem speaking at 12:35 pm & Auto Sales data.

Avadel Pharmaceuticals, California Resources Corp., Fortrea, N-able, Nomad Foods, Plug Power, Sunnova Energy & Surgery Partners are all due to report earnings on Monday morning, followed by ADMA Biologies, Concentra Group Holdings, GigaCloud Technology, GitLab, NuScale Power, Okta, Repay Holdings & W&T Offshore after the closing bell.

Fed President Williams speaks at 2:20 pm Tuesday, with Fed President Barkin speaking at a time yet to be determined.

Tuesday morning begins with earnings from Target, AutoZone, Best Buy, EV Go, Genius Sports, Olaplex, ON Semiconductor, Paysafe & Sea Ltd., with AeroVironment, Box, ChargePoint Holdings, Credo Technology Group, Credo Technology Group, Evolus, Flutter Entertainment, Nordstrom, Ross Stores & Sociedad Quimica y Minera due to report after the closing bell.

Wednesday begins with ADP Employment data at 8:15 am, before S&P Final U.S. Services PMI at 9:45 am, Factory Orders & ISM Services data at 10 am & the Fed Beige Book at 2 pm.

Abercrombie & Fitch, Brown-Forman, CG Oncology, Dine Brands, Foot Locker, REV Group, Riskified, SmartRent, South Bow, Stratasys & Thor Industries are all reporting earnings Wednesday morning before the session opens, with Descartes, Kodiak Gas Services, LandBridge, Marvell Technology, MongoDB, Sleep Number, Veeva Systems, Victoria’s Secret, Yext, Zscaler & Zymeworks all scheduled to report after the close.

Initial Jobless Claims, U.S. Productivity (Final) & U.S. Trade Deficit data are all due Thursday at 8:30 am, followed by Wholesale Inventories data at 10 am, Fed Governor Waller speaking at 3:30 pm & Fed President Bostic speaking at 7 pm.

Thursday morning’s earnings include America’s Car-Mart, BJ’s Wholesale, BrightSpring Health Services, Burlington Stores, Canadian Natural Resources, Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, GMS, Macy’s, Marex Group, Stevanato Group, The Toro Company & Turning Point Brands, before Broadcom, Costco Wholesale, Asure Software, BigBear.ai, Cooper, Domo, El Pollo Loco, Funko, Gap, Guidewire Software, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, MeridianLink, Samsara & Smith & Wesson Brands after the session’s close.

Friday the week winds down with U.S. Jobs Report, U.S. Unemployment Rate, U.S. Hourly Wages & Hourly Wages Year-over-Year data at 8:30 am, before Fed Governor Bowman speaks at 10:15 am, Fed President Williams speaks at 10:45 am, Fed Governor Kugler speaks at 12:20 pm, Fed Chairman Powell speaking at 12:30 pm & Consumer Credit data at 3pm.

Algonquin Power & Utilities & Genesco are both due to report earnings after the session’s close.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF dropped -1.6% this week, while the VIX closed the week out at 18.21, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.15% & an implied one month move of +/-5.26%.

The RSI just crossed bearishly through the neutral 50 mark, while their MACD crossed over bearishly on Friday.

Volumes were -19.47% lower than the previous year’s average (42,707,500 vs. 53,030,635), which carries bearish sentiment with it given that the opening two sessions of the week were advancing, but had the lowest volumes of the week.

Readers should also refer to last week’s note where we broke down the major declines in prior year’s volume from today’s levels to the same metric from one year ago to see how this weak participation rate is even worse given how much less volume this past year has seen vs. the prior year.

Tuesday kicked last week off on a rather ominous note as the extremely low volume session resulted in a hanging man candle (bearish) that also closed lower than it opened, after an opening gap up from the previous Friday’s close.

Wednesday’s candle formed a bullish engulfing pattern with Tuesday’s, but with the same low volume turnout there was nothing to get excited about for SPY.

Thursday confirmed this when SPY opened in the middle of Wednesday’s range, before plunging lower & testing the support of the 10 day moving average.

Volumes were slightly higher than the preceding two days, and the day’s candle formed a bearish harami pattern.

Friday opened lower & on the highest volume of 2025 SPY plunged through the support of their 10 day moving average & made a run lower at the 50 DMA’s support level.

As I am finishing writing this on Tuesday morning SPY has already broken through the 50 DMA, which brings us to an interesting week ahead.

As the table below notes, there is now (Tuesday) only one support level between SPY’s current price & a price zone that has been dominated by the Sellers at a rate of 1.88:1 over the past ~2-3 years.

This makes it likely that these support levels will not be able to sustain SPY’s current declines, which would mean prices are scheduled to drop -3.32%+ from Friday’s closing price.

It seems unlikely that SPY will see any major advances this week, and the most likely outcome will be either a continued decline & or a consolidation around the 50 day moving average.

NVIDIA Corp.’s earnings call tomorrow afternoon will likely be the linchpin that dictates which of those two outcomes occurs.

It will require a massive beat in order to see a turnaround for SPY & the advances to continue, making this week’s theme to watch for is how closely aligned SPY’s price stays with their 50 day moving average.

In the event of declines & changing (lowering) of support levels, the table below is useful to measure the strength or weakness of the new support/resistance levels.

One other item that should be on readers’ radar in the coming weeks is that the 200 day moving average (long-term trend) is -5.64% below Friday’s closing price.

That long-term trend line is also located in a Seller dominated zone, meaning that SPY’s long-term trend is potentially at risk of breaking down, as Sellers have been the favorites of the $565-569.99/share zone at a rate of 1.59:1 over the past ~2-3 years.

This will be especially interesting to watch if the price remains below the 10 & 50 day moving averages for many days or if it strays too far south of them.

SPY has support at the $598.82 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.47:1), $590.49 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1) & $580.91/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.88:1), with resistance at the $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.04:1), $606.85 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5.5:1), $607.03 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5.5:1) & $610.78/share (Volume Sentiment: NULL, 0:0*).

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF fell -2.24% last week, as the tech heavy index was not immune to the turbulence across broader markets.

The RSI also just crossed bearishly through the neutral 50-mark, while their MACD ended the week ready to bearishly crossover early this week.

Volumes were -18.83% below the previous year’s average (28,470,000 vs. 35,075,000), which much like SPY above is concerning given how low their current prior year’s average level is compared to that same metric from one year ago.

Tuesday kicked the week off in a similar manner to SPY, as QQQ opened on a gap up, but was forced lower to retrace most of the previous day’s range throughout the session on light volume & ultimately closed higher, but lower than it opened.

The uncertainty & skittishness continued into Wednesday, when another low participation session took place & the session ended as a high spinning top, indicating extreme uncertainty with a dash of nervousness among market participants.

Wednesday opened lower but was able to recover by the close & close higher on a day, but the caution lights were flashing brightly.

Thursday confirmed this when QQQ opened lower, briefly tried to climb higher, but was rejected & wound up going all the way down to test the support of the 10 day moving average.

While the support held up for Thursday, the session still resulted in a hanging man candle (bearish) & it became clear that with a little more volume there would be steeper losses on the horizon.

Friday delivered both the volume & the declines, as the third most active day of the year for QQQ fell straight through the 10 day moving average’s support, as market participants were all eager to hop out of the pool taking limited risk into the weekend.

While QQQ closed above the 50 day moving average’s support on Friday, it should be noted that it was only -0.49% below it when the session ended.

With the MACD set to crossover bearishly in the first half of this week, there will be a breakdown of QQQ’s 50 DMA.

This is problematic, as the next two support levels for QQQ are in Seller dominated zones (see table below) & the lower range of the bottom zone is a -4.01% decline from Friday’s closing price.

While NVDA is sure to impact the price of QQQ this week, as we’ve published for weeks now anything to the upside that has staying power will need a big improvement in volume, else it should be viewed with skepticism.

All eyes should be watching how the price & 50 day moving average move in relation to one another this week, as pending no high volume pivot north & no outright disappointing news the best case scenario currently looks like QQQ’s price will move around straddling the 50 DMA’s support/resistance.

In the event of outright declines, the $499.70/share support level will be an area to keep an eye on as it occurs in a zone with limited data on historic selling pressure, as Buyers have typically outdone Sellers at a rate of 2:0*, which may mean we get to see more sellers emerge at this level.

It’s also important as its the second to last support level before the 200 day moving average (long-term trend) is approached by QQQ’s price, and in the event of a breakdown it appears that the long-term trend will at least be tested.

QQQ has support at the $523.48 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1), $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3.13:1), $511.05 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3.13:1) & $508.47/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.54:1), with resistance in the $531.24 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.2:1), $532.47 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.2:1), $533.82 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.2:1) & $538.28/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.7:0*).

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF declined -3.62% last week, as the small cap index had the worst performance out of the major four index ETFs.

The RSI is approaching oversold territory & currently sits at 35.41, while the MACD has been bearish for the past few sessions.

Volumes were -17.72% below the prior year’s average (23,727,500 vs. 28,836,032), which is even low based on the standards of the prior two index ETF’s Y-o-Y comparisons, as IWM’s look-back comparison is only ~-15% from one year ago.

Tuesday started the week off on a positive, but worrisome note for the already battered IWM, as the week’s lowest volume session resulted in slight gains.

Wednesday saw the unraveling begin, with a gap down open that was below both the closely-knit 10 & 50 DMAs, and prices were able to run higher, temporarily breaking above each, but the day closed with low volume & in-line with the moving averages.

Thursday saw an uptick in volume, as IWM opened in-line with the 10 & 50 day moving averages, before cratering lower & leaving a lower shadow that showed that was still a lot of bearish sentiment abound.

Friday brought one of last week’s observations to the forefront quickly, as the session opened just above the 10 & 50 day moving averages, but the sellers came out at the highest level of 2025 to drive IWM’s price lower, to the point of temporarily breaking through the 200 DMA’s support.

IWM still closed just above the long-term trend line, but it became clear that there is appetite for IWM to continue lower in the near-term.

This is especially likely given that the $212-215.99/share price zone is historically a Seller’s Paradise at a rate of 1.29:1 over the past ~2-3 years.

In the event that this long-term trend does break down, it will be prudent to keep an eye on how the $208/share level holds up, as the Buyer dominated zones beneath it are not as strong as the $208-211.99 zone.

Otherwise, the current best case near-term scenario looks to be IWM oscillating around the 200 DMA while it continues its recent consolidation.

While it isn’t impossible, any upside move would need a great deal of volume behind it before it shows to have any staying power & sustainability, and it would also be stuck beneath some strong resistance levels/zones.

It would be wise to reference the table below in the coming weeks in regards to IWM’s price levels & support/resistance.

IWM has support at the $217.49 (200 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.37:1), $216.73 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.37:1), $214.01 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1) & $213.97/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1), with resistance at the $217.85 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers 1.37:1), $220.67 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.23:1), $221.04 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.23:1) & $223.51/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.23:1).

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF fell -2.61% last week, as even the blue chip stocks were not immune to the losses across the board.

The RSI is also approaching the oversold level of 30 & currently sits bearishly at 39.73, while the MACD has been bearish for the past couple of weeks.

Volumes were -11.62% lower than the previous year’s average (2,872,500 vs. 3,250,159), which is a warning sign given that their Y-o-Y prior year’s average volume is only down -6%, so there is a bit of fear out there.

Tuesday saw a low volume session that’s lower shadow on the day’s candle & the fact that the day closed in-line with the resistance of the 10 day moving average signaled that there was a bit of trouble ahead for DIA.

Wednesday opened on a gap lower, tested to about the same depths as Tuesday, before powering north of the 10 DMA’s resistance to close above it for an advancing session.

However, the low volume levels did not provide adequate confirmation that the move had any traction.

Thursday opened lower, near in-line with the 10 DMA’s support, before caving & at one point trading below the $440/share mark.

Volumes ticked up on Thursday, hinting that there would be a big risk-off into the weekend session.

DIA provided that on Friday, while on the highest volume of the week & second highest of the year they opened on a gap down, blew through the 50 day moving average & continued lower, closing in a daily decline of -1.72%.

With the 50 DMA broken through, it puts the long-term trend in danger, as it sits -4.5% below Friday’s closing price.

Now that the 10 & 50 DMAs are both sitting atop the price, it looks like there will be continued weakness & some profit taking in the coming week(s) for DIA.

One area of strength that they have is that there are more support touch-points along the way down to the 200 DMA re-test, but if there are broader market declines that will be of little importance.

Best case outlook for DIA for the rest of the week is a consolidation range around the 50 DMA, but there are a few windows that still haven’t been filled which may lead to a re-test of that long-term trend line sooner than most anticipate.

It would be wise to reference the table below as DIA approaches & retests support/resistance levels over the next week or two to understand how market participants have typically behaved at these levels.

DIA has support at the $432.86 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.75:1), $430.88 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.5:1), $427.60 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.25:1) & $420.93/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.5:1), with resistance at the $436.39 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1), $442.49 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1), $443.39 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4:1) & $449.41/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers 0.6:0*).

The Week Ahead

Monday has no major economic data due for release.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Clearway Energy, Domino’s Pizza, Fresh Del Monte, KBR, Owens Corning & Westlake all report earnings Monday before the opening bell, followed by Atlas Energy Solutions, Beyond, BWX Technologies, Cannae Holdings, Chegg, Civitas Resources, Clean Energy Fuels, Cleveland-Cliffs, Coterra Energy, Diamondback Energy, Douglas Dynamics, EverQuote, Goosehead Insurance, Helios Technologies, Hims & Hers Health, JBT Marel, LTC Properties, MediaAlpha, Myriad Genetics, Navitas Semiconductor, ONEOK, Primoris Services, ProAssurance, Public Storage, Quaker Chemical, Realty Income, Riot Platforms, SBA Communications, Tempus AI, Topgolf Callaway Brands, Trex, Trip.com Group, Ultra Clean Holdings, V2X, Veracyte, Viper Energy Partners, Ziff Davis & Zoom Communications, after the session’s close.

Fed President Logan speaks Tuesday at 3:20 am, followed by S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index (20 Cities) at 9 am & Consumer Confidence at 10 am.

Tuesday’s pre-market earnings calls include Home Depot, AdaptHealth, Alcon, Amer Sports, American Tower, Archrock, Arcus Biosciences, Armstrong World Industries, Bank of Montreal, Bank of Nova Scotia, Carter’s, CECO Environmental, CG Oncology, Delek US Holdings, Diana Shipping, DigitalOcean, Driven Brands, Easterly Government Properties, Elanco Animal Health, Expro Group, GFL Environmental, Harmony Biosciences, Henry Schein, Integra, Interface, International Game Technology, Itron, Keurig Dr Pepper, Kiniksa Pharmaceuticals, Kontoor Brands, Krispy Kreme, LGI Homes, LivaNova, Novanta, Pinnacle West, Planet Fitness, Portillo’s, Public Service, Sealed Air, Sempra Energy, Shoals Technologies, Shutterstock, Super Group, TopBuild, Viking Holdings, Xenia Hotels & Xometry, with Agilon Health, AMC Entertainment, Axon, B&G Foods, Boston Beer, Caesars Entertainment, Camping World, CAVA Group, CCC Intelligent Solutions, Chord Energy, Coupang, Day One Biopharmaceuticals, ExlService, Extra Space Storage, First Solar, Flywire, Grocery Outlet, Huron Consulting, Inogen, Instacart, Interparfums, Intuit, Jack In The Box, Jazz Pharmaceuticals, Keysight Technologies, Lemonade, Light & Wonder, Lucid Group, Maravai Life Sciences, Masimo, Matson, Merit Medical, National Health, ODDITY Tech, OraSure, OUTFRONT Media, Par Pacific, Permian Resources, Playa Hotels & Resorts, PROCEPT BioRobotics, Range Resources, Revolve Group, RLJ Lodging Trust, RxSight, Skyward Specialty Insurance Group, Sprout Social, SPX Technologies, Supernus Pharma, TETRA Technologies, The Baldwin Group, Vaxcyte, WEBTOON Entertainment, Workday, Workiva, Zeta Global, ZipRecruiter & ZoomInfo all due to report after the closing bell.

Wednesday features New Home Sales data at 10 am.

ACM Research, Advance Auto Parts, AerCap, APi Group, Astec Industries, AvidXchange, Avista, Bentley Systems, Bloomin’ Brands, Brinks, CBIZ, Centuri Holdings, Clear Secure, Commscope, Dole, DT Midstream, EMCOR Group, Enovis Corp, Federal Signal, Geron, International Money Express, Janus International Group, Lantheus Holdings, Lineage, Loar Holdings, Lowe’s, Madrigal Pharmaceuticals, MGP Ingredients, National Vision, NRG Energy, ODP Corp, Option Care Health, Photronics, Rhythm Pharmaceuticals, Southwest Gas, StandardAero, Steven Madden, Taboola, The Vita Coco Company, United Parks & Resorts, Verisk Analytics & XPEL all report earnings before Wednesday’s opening bell, followed by the much anticipated Nvidia, Salesforce, Agilent Technologies, Albany International, Alphatec, Ambarella, Applied Optoelectronics, Barrett Business, Beyond Meat, Cactus, CareDx, Certara, Chemed, Chesapeake Utilities, Corcept Therapeutics, Dorman Products, eBay, Encore Capital, Energy Recovery, EPR Properties, Essential Utilities, Establishment Labs, EVERTEC, Expand Energy, FirstEnergy, Forward Air, Green Brick Partners, Greif, HEICO, Howard Hughes Holdings, Ibotta, Innovex International, Invitation Homes, IonQ, Joby Aviation, Kinetik, Kratos Defense and Security, LegalZoom.com, Magnite, MARA Holdings, Marqeta, Marriott Vacations, MYR Group, National Storage Affiliates, New Mountain Finance, Nutanix, Ormat Technologies, Ovintiv, Paramount Global, Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, Pure Storage, Root, Rush Street Interactive, Sarepta Therapeutics, Schrodinger, Seadrill, Sinclair Broadcast, Sitio Royalties, Snowflake, Stoneridge, Sun Communities, Sweetgreen, Synopsys, Talos Energy, Tandem Diabetes Care, Teladoc, TKO Group Holdings, Universal Health, Urban Outfitters, Vir Biotechnology, VSE Corp & Western Midstream who are all due to report after the closing bell.

Initial Jobless Claims, Durable-Goods Orders, Durable-Goods minus Transportation & GDP (second revision) are all due out Thursday morning at 8:30 am, followed by Pending Home Sales data at 10 am & Fed President Hammack speaking at 1:15 pm.

Thursday morning kicks off with earnings from Acushnet, ADT, American Woodmark, Ardagh Metal Packaging, Bath & Body Works, Beacon Roofing Supply, California Water, Cars.com, CIBC, Cogent Communications, Dentsply Sirona, Donaldson, Ducommun, Ecovyst, Endeavor Group, Evergy, Frontdoor, GoodRx, Gray Media, Hayward Holdings, Hilton Grand Vacations, Hormel Foods, Installed Building Products, International Seaways, J.M. Smucker, Kimbell Royalty Partners, Koppers Holdings, Life Time, LifeStance Health Group, Ligand Pharmaceuticals, Macerich, Millicom International Cellular, NCR Voyix, Nexstar, Norwegian Cruise Line, NovoCure, Papa John’s, Payoneer, PENN Entertainment, Playtika, Privia Health, Royal Bank of Canada, Scholar Rock, SITE Centers, Sotera Health, Stagwell, Starwood Property Trust, Strategic Education, TechnipFMC, Tecnoglass, TEGNA, Teleflex, Thryv, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Trimas, Vericel, Vertex, Vital Farms, Warby Parker & Warner Bros. Discovery, with Acadia Healthcare, Alignment Healthcare, Alkami Technology, Ameresco, American Healthcare REIT, Arcadium Lithium, Arcosa, Arlo Technologies, Array Technologies, Assured Guaranty, Astrana Health, Autodesk, AvePoint, Bloom Energy, Bloom Energy, Collegium Pharmaceutical, Compass Diversified, Crinetics Pharmaceuticals, CubeSmart, Cytokinetics, Definitive Healthcare, Dell Technologies, Diamondrock Hospitality, dLocal, DoubleVerify, Duolingo, Edison International, Elastic, FIGS, Inc., Fox Factory Holding, Green Dot, HP Inc., ICF International, ICU Medical, Iovance Biotherapeutics, Jamf Holding, MasTec, Metallus, Mosaic, Natera, NetApp, nLIGHT, Opendoor Technologies, Opko Health, Paramount Group, Pembina Pipeline, Perrigo, Progyny, PubMatic, Redfin, Rocket Companies, Rocket Lab USA, Solventum, SoundHound AI, Sunrun, Talen Energy, TransMedics Group, Treace Medical Concepts, Tutor Perini & Verra Mobility all scheduled to report after the closing bell.

Friday the week winds down with Personal Income, Personal Spending, PCE Index, PCE Index (Year-over-Year), Core PCE Index, Core PCE (Year-over-Year), Advanced U.S. Trade Balance in Goods, Advanced Retail Inventories & Advanced Wholesale Inventories data at 8:30 am, followed by Chicago Business Barometer (PMI) at 9:45 am, Existing Home Sales & Consumer Sentiment (final) at 10 am & Fed President Goolsbee speaking at 10:15 am.

Alpha Metallurgical Resources, ANI Pharmaceuticals, Apellis Pharmaceuticals, Chart Industries, Chart Industries, Fulgent Genetics, Integral Ad Science, Northwest Natural, Owens & Minor & PAR Technology are all due to report earnings before Friday’s opening bell.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

Stocks have had an interesting & full past month & a half since our last Volume Sentiment Analysis on 1/2/25, featuring declines, advances & a bit of consolidation as well.

SPY & QQQ are still near all-time highs, DIA’s ~1% below their ATH & IWM has been in a relatively range-bound oscillation phase.

Meanwhile, last night the VIX closed at 15.35, indicating an implied one day move of +/-0.97% & an implied one month move of +/-4.44% for the S&P 500.

There are a lot of mixed signals out there, but one thing is certain, market participants have lost steam & are beginning to get a bit nervous.

As noted in this week’s note, when comparing the previous year’s average volume vs. that same metric from 2/18/2024 SPY’s average volume is down -34.7% Y-o-Y, QQQ’s average volume is down -31.44% Y-o-Y, IWM’s is -15.93% lower Y-o-Y & DIA’s is -6% lower Y-o-Y.

This will need to change if there is going to be any meaningful breakouts above the recent all-time highs that are sustainable runs.

January’s FOMC minutes are due to be released this afternoon, NVDA reports earnings one week from today & there are still many other earnings reports due out this & next week, which are all things that traders & investors are waiting on before deciding their next moves.

With this in mind, it is important to understand how each index ETF has performed in recent history, as it lends clues into the strength/weakness of each index’s support/resistance levels.

This can be valuable when assessing risk in the event of retests of any of these levels.

Each section below contains a view of each index ETF’s chart (for a technical breakdown of each ETF’s chart please see this past weekend’s market review note), as well as a list of their current one year support & resistance levels with the volume sentiment noted beneath it on the table.

There is an additional table beneath this table with each price level’s sentiment, as well as a typed text version below that is able to be copied & pasted.

Note that “NULL, 0:0*” values denote areas that each name has traded at but with limited volume data to work with from a comparison standpoint in terms of creating a ratio of buyers:sellers (or vice versa) or is the outlier above the highest/lowest level with price data.

Also, prices that do have a ratio of Buyers:Sellers (Sellers:Buyers) where the denominator is 0 are denoted with an asterisk “*” as well.

In the written lists of the price levels & volume sentiments the price levels that contain support & resistance levels are marked in BOLD.

Recall that at price extremes such as the highs that we have recently hit there will tend to be skewed data due to the small sample size & factor that into how you interpret each price level’s reported sentiment.

This is intended to serve as an additional tool, similar to a barometer to use during your due diligence process & is not meant to replace doing your own research & is not financial advice.

Price Level:Volume Sentiment Analysis For SPY, The SPDR S&P 500 ETF

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF‘s volume above is concerning, given that their resistance level is their all-time high but volumes have been visibly declining throughout 2025.

In the event that there is no catalyst higher the data below will be helpful to assess the risks associated with each support level’s retest in the near-term.

The flattening of SPY’s moving averages is also an area of concern, making it even more important to review the data in the tables below, which outlines the volume sentiments of each price level SPY has traded at over the past ~3 years.

$610 – NULL – 0:0*, -0.24% From Current Price Level – Current Price Level & All-Time High**

$605 – Buyers – 5.5:1, -1.06% From Current Price Level – 10 Day Moving Average*

$600 – Sellers – 1.04:1, -1.88% From Current Price Level

$595 – Buyers – 1.47:1, -2.7% From Current Price Level – 50 Day Moving Average*

$590 – Buyers – 4:1, -3.51% From Current Price Level

$585 – Buyers – 1.55:1, -4.33% From Current Price Level

$580 – Sellers – 1.88:1, -5.15% From Current Price Level

$575 – Buyers – 1.08:1, -5.97% From Current Price Level

$570 – Buyers – 5.33:1, -6.79% From Current Price Level

$565 – Sellers -1.59:1, -7.6% From Current Price Level

$560 – Buyers – 1.8:0*, -8.42% From Current Price Level – 200 Day Moving Average*

$555 – Buyers – 3.44:1, -9.24% From Current Price Level

$550 – Buyers – 1.25:1, -10.06% From Current Price Level

$545 – Sellers – 1.06:1, -10.87% From Current Price Level

$540 – Buyers – 2.42:1, -11.69% From Current Price Level

$535 – Sellers – 1.36:1, -12.51% From Current Price Level

$530 – Buyers – 1.5:1, -13.33% From Current Price Level

$525 – Buyers – 1.6:1, -14.14% From Current Price Level

$520 – Buyers -2.08:1, -14.96% From Current Price Level

$515 – Buyers – 1.33:1, -15.78% From Current Price Level

$510 – Buyers – 1.9:1, -16.6% From Current Price Level

$505 – Sellers – 1.65:1, -17.14% From Current Price Level

$500 -Buyers – 1.8:1, -18.23% From Current Price Level

$496 – Sellers – 2.9:0*, -18.89% From Current Price Level

$492 – Buyers – 1.24:1, -19.54% From Current Price Level

$488 – Buyers – 1.45:1, -20.19% From Current Price Level

$484 – Sellers – 1.67:1, -20.85% From Current Price Level

$480 – Buyers – 2.2:1, -21.5% From Current Price Level

$476 – Buyers – 2.33:1, -22.16% From Current Price Level

$472 – NULL – 0:0*, – 22.81% From Current Price Level

$468 – Buyers – 1.95:1, -23.47% From Current Price Level

$464 – Buyers – 1.35:1, -24.12% From Current Price Level

$460 – Sellers – 2.33:1, -24.77% From Current Price Level

$456 – Buyers – 0.4:0*, -25.43% From Current Price Level

$452 – Buyers – 1:0*, -26.08% From Current Price Level

$448 – Buyers- 2:1, -26.74% From Current Price Level

$444 – Buyers – 2.21:1, -27.39% From Current Price Level

$440 – Buyers – 2:1, -28.04% From Current Price Level

$436 – Sellers – 1.09:1, -28.7% From Current Price Level

$432 – Buyers – 1.24:1, -29.35% From Current Price Level

$428 – Sellers – 1.21:1, -30.01% From Current Price Level

$424 – Buyers – 1.38:1, -30.66% From Current Price Level

$420 – Sellers – 1.19:1, -31.32% From Current Price Level

$416 – Buyers – 1.34:1, -31.97% From Current Price Level

$412 – Sellers – 1.11:1, -32.62% From Current Price Level

$408 – Buyers – 3.18:1, -33.28% From Current Price Level

$404 – Buyers – 1.42:1, -33.93% From Current Price Level

$400 – Buyers – 1.1:1, -34.59% From Current Price Level

$396 – Sellers – 1.18:1, -35.24% From Current Price Level

$392 – Sellers – 1.14:1, -35.89% From Current Price Level

$388 – Buyers – 2.22:1, -36.55% From Current Price Level

$384 – Buyers – 1.88:1, -37.2% From Current Price Level

$380 – Sellers – 1.29:1, -37.86% From Current Price Level

$376 – Sellers – 2.61:1, -38.5% From Current Price Level

$372 – Sellers – 1.95:1, -39.16% From Current Price Level

$368 – Sellers – 1.93:1, -39.82% From Current Price Level

$364 – Sellers – 1.16:1, -40.47% From Current Price Level

$360 – Sellers – 2.6:1, -41.13% From Current Price Level

$356 – Sellers – 2.53:1, -42.78% From Current Price Level

$352 – Buyers – 1.36:1. -42.44% From Current Price Level

$348 – Sellers – 3.7:0*, -43.09% From Current Price Level

$344 – Sellers – 3:0*, -43.74% From Current Price Level

$340 – NULL – 0:0*, -44.4% From Current Price Level

Price Level:Volume Sentiment Analysis For QQQ, The Invesco QQQ Trust ETF

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF that tracks the NASDAQ 100 has also witnessed a similar reduction in volume while sitting near all-time highs.

Without a meaningful increase in volume it seems unlikely that there’s much of a chance of a sustainable climb higher beyond the current ATH’s from here & that there will be retests of their more recent support levels.

Given that these support levels are relatively sparse as noted in this week’s note (link in into section), it is beneficial to understand how market participants have behaved at each price level QQQ’s traded at over the past ~2-3 years, shown below.

$540 – NULL – 0:0*, +0.12% From Current Price Level – All-Time High*

$535 – Buyers – 0.7:0*, -0.81% From Current Price Level – Current Price Level*

$530 – Buyers – 2.2:1, -1.74% From Current Price Level – 10 Day Moving Average*

$525 – Buyers – 2.46:1, -2.66% From Current Price Level

$520 – Buyers – 1.6:1, -3.59% From Current Price Level – 50 Day Moving Average*

$515 – Sellers – 1.09:1, -4.52% From Current Price Level

$510 – Sellers – 3.13:1, -5.45% From Current Price Level

$505 – Sellers – 1.54:1, -6.37% From Current Price Level

$500 – Buyers – 3.22:1, -7.3% From Current Price Level

$496 – Buyers – 2:0*, -8.04% From Current Price Level

$492 – Buyers – 4.13:1, -8.78% From Current Price Level

$488 – Buyers – 1.57:1, -9.52% From Current Price Level

$484 – Buyers – 1.88:1, -10.27% From Current Price Level – 200 Day Moving Average*

$480 – Buyers – 1.24:1, -11.01% From Current Price Level

$476 – Sellers – 1.52:1, -11.75% From Current Price Level

$472 – Buyers – 1.52:1, -12.49% From Current Price Level

$468 – Sellers – 1.23:1, -13.23% From Current Price Level

$464 – Buyers – 1.6:0*, -13.97% From Current Price Level

$460 – Buyers – 1.32:1, -14.72% From Current Price Level

$456 – Sellers – 1.89:1, -15.46% From Current Price Level

$452 – Buyers – 2.5:1, -16.2% From Current Price Level

$448 – Sellers – 1.39:1, -16.94% From Current Price Level

$444 – Sellers – 1.4:1, -17.68% From Current Price Level

$440 – Buyers – 4.22:1, -18.42% From Current Price Level

$436 – Buyers – 1.05:1, -19.16% From Current Price Level

$432 – Sellers – 2:1, -19.91% From Current Price Level

$428 – Buyers – 1.42:1, -20.65% From Current Price Level

$424 – Sellers – 1.06:1, -21.39% From Current Price Level

$420 – Sellers – 2:1, -22.13% From Current Price Level

$416 – Buyers – 4:1, -22.87% From Current Price Level

$412 – Sellers – 2.6:0*, -23.61% From Current Price Level

$408 – Buyers – 4.2:1, -24.36% From Current Price Level

$404 – Buyers – 2.2:1, -25.1% From Current Price Level

$400 – Buyers – 1.81:1, -25.84% From Current Price Level

$396 – Sellers – 1.1:0*, -26.58% From Current Price Level

$392 – Buyers – 1.5:1, -27.32% From Current Price Level

$388 – Buyers – 1:0*, -28.06% From Current Price Level

$384 – Buyers – 1.49:1, -28.81% From Current Price Level

$380 – Buyers – 1.89:1, -29.55% From Current Price Level

$376 – Buyers – 3.86:1. -30.29% From Current Price Level

$372 – Buyers – 1.2:1, -31.03% From Current Price Level

$368 – Sellers – 1.15:1, -31.77% From Current Price Level

$364 – Buyers – 1.66:1, -32.51% From Current Price Level

$360 – Buyers – 1.17:1, -33.26% From Current Price Level

$356 – Sellers – 1.13:1, -34% From Current Price Level

$352 – Buyers – 1.22:1, -34.74% From Current Price Level

$348 – Buyers – 1.14:1, -35.48% From Current Price Level

$344 – Buyers – 1.24:1, -36.22% From Current Price Level

$340 – Sellers – 1.17:1, -36.96% From Current Price Level

$336 – NULL – 0:0*, -37.71% From Current Price Level

$332 – Buyers – 3:1, -38.45% From Current Price Level

$328 – Sellers – 1:0*, -39.19% From Current Price Level

$324 – Even – 1:1, -39.93% From Current Price Level

$320 -Buyers – 4:1, -40.67% From Current Price Level

$316 – Buyers- 2.09:1, -41.41% From Current Price Level

$312 – Sellers – 1.76:1, -42.15% From Current Price Level

$308 – Buyers – 1.82:1, -42.9% From Current Price Level

$304 – Buyers – 7.1:1, -43.64% From Current Price Level

$300 – Sellers – 1.28:1, -44.38% From Current Price Level

$296 – Sellers – 1.63:1, -45.12% From Current Price Level

$292 – Buyers – 3.36:1, -45.86% From Current Price Level

$288 – Buyers – 1.11:1, -46.6% From Current Price Level

$284 – Sellers – 1.33:1, -47.35% From Current Price Level

$280 – Sellers – 1.5:1, -48.09% From Current Price Level

$276 – Buyers – 2.06:1, -48.83% From Current Price Level

$272 – Even – 1:1, -49.57% From Current Price Level

$268 – Sellers – 1.25:1, -50.31% From Current Price Level

$264 – Buyers – 1.18:1, -51.05% From Current Price Level

$260 – Sellers – 2:1, -51.8% From Current Price Level

$256 – NULL – 0:0*, -52.54% From Current Price Level

Price Level:Volume Sentiment Analysis For IWM, The iShares Russell 2000 ETF

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF‘s recent volume declines are similar to SPY & QQQ’s, but not quite as drastic when compared to the year prior.

Still, given that they have been oscillating between support & resistance zones for much of 2025 to date it is worth having an understanding of how each support/resistance level/zone has held up in terms of strength/weakness in order to assess risk moving forward.

The tables below outline IWM’s volume sentiment at each price level that they’ve traded at over the past ~3 years, which will also prove beneficial when they ultimately break out, be it to the upside or downside.

$244 – NULL – 0:0*, +7.39% From Current Price Level – All Time High*

$240 – Buyers – 4.67:1, +5.63% From Current Price Level

$236 – Buyers – 1.54:1, +3.87% From Current Price Level

$232 – Sellers – 1.63:1, +2.11% From Current Price Level

$228 – Buyers – 1.64:1, +0.35% From Current Price Level

$224 – Buyers – 1.22:1, -1.41% From Current Price Level – Current Price Level, 10 & 50 Day Moving Averages***

$220 – Buyers – 1.23:1, -3.17% From Current Price Level

$216 – Buyers – 1.37:1, -4.93% From Current Price Level – 200 Day Moving Average*

$212 – Sellers – 1.29:1, -6.69% From Current Price Level

$208 – Buyers – 2.64:1, -8.45% From Current Price Level

$204 – Buyers – 1.21:1, -10.22% From Current Price Level

$200 – Buyers – 1.54:1, -11.98% From Current Price Level

$198 – Sellers – 1.53:1, -12.86% From Current Price Level

$196 – Buyers – 2.5:1, -13.74% From Current Price Level

$194 – Buyers – 1.15:1, -14.62% From Current Price Level

$192 – Sellers – 1.2:1, -15.5% From Current Price Level

$190 – Sellers – 2.29:1, -16.38% From Current Price Level

$188 – Buyers – 1.64:1, -17.26% From Current Price Level

$186 – Sellers – 1.44:1, -18.14% From Current Price Level

$184 – Buyers – 2.8:1, -19.02% From Current Price Level

$182 – Buyers – 1.67:1, -19.9% From Current Price Level

$180 – Buyers – 1.2:1, -20.78% From Current Price Level

$178 – Sellers – 1.78:1, -21.66% From Current Price Level

$176 – Buyers – 1.12:1, -22.54% From Current Price Level

$174 – Buyers – 2.08:1, -23.42% From Current Price Level

$172 – Buyers – 1.31:1, -24.3% From Current Price Level

$170 – Buyers – 1.39:1, -25.18% From Current Price Level

$168 – Sellers – 2.39:1, 26.06% From Current Price Level

$166 – Sellers – 2.6:1, -26.94% From Current Price Level

$164 – Sellers – 0.4:0*, -27.82% From Current Price Level

$162 – Buyers – 1.18:1, -28.7% From Current Price Level

$160 – Even – 1:1, -29.58% From Current Price Level

$158 – NULL – 0:0*, -30.46% From Current Price Level

Price Level:Volume Sentiment Analysis For DIA, The SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF has also seen less volume over the month of February while it has been in a consolidation range just below it’s all-time high.

With a flat 10 Day Moving Average just below its price & a flat 50 DMA just -5.28% below it & limited other support levels it’s a good time to check in on the volume sentiment around the prices that it has traded at in recent history.

The tables below outline DIA’s volume sentiment at the price levels it has traded at over the past ~4-5 years.

$452 – NULL – 0:0*, +1.36% From Current Price Level

$448 – Buyers – 0.6:0*, +0.47% From Current Price Level – All-Time High*

$444 – Sellers – 1.29:1, -0.43% From Current Price Level – Current Price Level & 10 Day Moving Average*

$440 – Buyers – 4:1, -1.33% From Current Price Level

$436 – Buyers – 1.6:1, -2.22% From Current Price Level – 50 Day Moving Average*

$432 – Buyers – 2.75:1, -3.12% From Current Price Level

$428 – Buyers – 4.5:1, -4.02% From Current Price Level

$424 – Sellers – 2.25:1, -4.92% From Current Price Level

$420 – Buyers – 1.5:1, -5.81% From Current Price Level

$416 – Sellers – 1.11:1, -6.71% From Current Price Level

$412 – Even – 1:1, -7.61% From Current Price Level – 200 Day Moving Average*

$408 – Buyers – 12:1, -8.5% From Current Price Level

$404 – Buyers – 2.4:1, -9.4% From Current Price Level

$400 – Sellers – 1.17:1, -10.3% From Current Price Level

$396 – Buyers – 9:1, -11.19% From Current Price Level

$392 – Buyers – 2.67:1, -12.09% From Current Price Level

$388 – Buyers – 1.75:1, -12.99% From Current Price Level

$384 – Buyers – 1.28:1, -13.89% From Current Price Level

$380 – Sellers – 1.17:1, -14.78% From Current Price Level

$376 – Buyers – 1.23:1, -15.68% From Current Price Level

$372 – Buyers – 1.55:1, -16.58% From Current Price Level

$368 – Buyers – 4:1, -17.47% From Current Price Level

$364 – Buyers – 1.22:1, -18.37% From Current Price Level

$360 – NULL – 0:0*, -19.27% From Current Price Level

$356 – Buyers – 0.8:0*, -20.17% From Current Price Level

$352 – Sellers – 2.33:1, -21.06% From Current Price Level

$348 – NULL – 0:0*, -21.96% From Current Price Level

$344 – Buyers – 4:1, -22.86% From Current Price Level

$340 – Buyers – 1.03:1, -23.75% From Current Price Level

$336 – Buyers – 1.34:1, -24.65% From Current Price Level

$332 – Buyers – 1.78:1, -25.55% From Current Price Level

$328 – Buyers – 1.15:1, -26.44% From Current Price Level

$324 – Sellers – 1.12:1, -27.34% From Current Price Level

$320 – Buyers – 1.04:1 – 28.24% From Current Price Level

$316 – Sellers – 1.34:1, -29.14% From Current Price Level

$312 – Sellers – 1.26:1, -30.03% From Current Price Level

$308 – Sellers – 2.46:1, -30.96% From Current Price Level

$304 – Buyers – 1.12:1, -31.83% From Current Price Level

$300 – Buyers – 1.58:1, -32.72% From Current Price Level

$296 – Buyers – 1.27:1, -33.62% From Current Price Level

$292 – Sellers – 1.46:1, -34.52% From Current Price Level

$288 – Sellers – 1.58:1, -35.41% From Current Price Level

$284 – Buyers – 1.08:1, -36.31% From Current Price Level

$280 – Buyers – 1.12:1, -37.21% From Current Price Level

$276 – Sellers – 1.36:1, -38.11% From Current Price Level

$272 – Buyers – 1.17:1, -39% From Current Price Level

$268 – Buyers – 2:1, -39.9% From Current Price Level

$264 – NULL – 0:0*, -40.8% From Current Price Level

$260 – Buyers – 3:1, -41.69% From Current Price Level

$256 – Buyers – 0.4:0*, -42.59% From Current Price Level

$252 – Buyers – 0.3:0*, -43.49% From Current Price Level

$248 – Buyers – 0.3:0*, -44.38% From Current Price Level

$244 – NULL – 0:0*, -45.28% From Current Price Level

$240 – NULL – 0:0*, -46.18% From Current Price Level

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF gained +1.49% last week, while the VIX closed the week at 14.77, indicating an implied one day move of +/-0.93% & an implied one month move of +/-4.27%.

Their RSI is flat, midway between the neutral 50 mark & overbought 70 mark, sitting currently at 58.97, whiel their MACD remains bullish, but muted on the histogram due to the relative range-bound action of the past two weeks.

Volumes were -36.69% lower than the prior year’s average level (33.804,000 vs. 53,393,785), indicating that there is still a lot of hesitancy among market participants & adds to fears noted in prior weeks’ notes about how the current all-time highs will be difficult to break with staying power unless there is a major uptick in market participation (see here).

This is also important to note, as over the passing two weeks SPY’s average annual prior year’s volume has declined -2.63%, which will continue as we’ve noted over the past year as since 4/19/2024 average volumes have fallen dramatically.

To visualize this, one year ago in 2/18/2024’s Market Review Note the previous year’s average level was 81,771,964 as volumes began to wane in general, meaning this week’s average prior year’s level has fallen -34.7% lower Y-o-Y.

This should be viewed with caution given that we are still near all-time highs, but 1 of every 3 transactions that used to take place among market participants is no longer happening, indicating a high degree of uncertainty & hesitancy.

Between the upcoming wave of earnings this week, the January FOMC minutes coming out on Wednesday & the anticipated NVDA earnings call on 2/26/25 it looks like things will continue to oscillate around the 10 day moving average, much like they have for the past couple of weeks.

Monday opened the week up with a bearish harami candle on very low volume, where the 10 DMA’s support was able to hold up.

Tuesday showed a gap down open to below the 10 DMA’s support, but the resistance level was broken & SPY managed to end the day higher, forming a bullish engulfing pattern on slightly stronger, but still very weak volume, confirming the uneasiness mentioned above.

Wednesday is where all eyes should be when looking at the past week’s chart, as the week’s highest volume session opened on a gap down that flirted with the 50 day moving average’s support to the downside, but was able to power higher, temporarily breaking above the resistance of the 10 day moving average, before closing in line with it.

As the week’s average volume numbers show though, this was still not much to write home about despite the “high turnout” for the week.

Thursday saw slightly lower volume than Wednesday, and opened on a gap up, tested the 10 DMA’s support & then powered higher for the day, but the volume was still rather poor when the context of the annualized average volume is taken into account from above.

Friday the week wound down on a note of caution heading into the shortened holiday week this week, as the second lowest volume of the week resulted in a single day -0.00% decline.

The reason for the concern is that the doji combined with Thursday’s candle look set to create an evening doji star pattern potentially, which would be indicative of near-term pain on the horizon for SPY.

The volume of the past week wasn’t enough to keep SPY’s price above the all-time high when it broke through it temporarily on Friday, and that theme is still on the table.

Even should a rally occur, if the volume isn’t noticeably higher it would be wise to view it with skepticism & expect a high probability of a throwback before mid-March.

Moving into the new week it is going to be interesting to see what sort of upside momentum can be gathered, as SPY is just beneath its all-time high, but needs the volume mentioned above.

The likely average case will be a continuation of the oscillations around the 10 day moving average that we have been watching for the past few weeks & like much of December held, with some gap moves & then consolidation ranges.

Should this be the case & or any downside breakdown at all of the 10 DMA’s support take place there will be reasons for being vigilant in the coming week(s).

The 10 DMA currently is in a price zone that has historically been even, 1:1 between sellers & buyers over the past ~2 years & there is only one other support level separating the 10 & 50 DMAs.

When you consider that the 50 DMA is only -0.98% below the 10 DMA there’s limited room for a decline & waning enthusiasm for dip buyers to step in & make hold up the limited support levels.

It should also be noted that ~2% below the 50 DMA is the following support level, before just over 1% lower a Seller zone is entered, where Sellers have shown up 2.1:1.

While the next price zone below that one is Buyer dominated, but only at a rate of 1.08:1 & the only current support level is a hair above the lowest level of that price zone (see table below).

It’s become very evident that there’s a great need for vigilance in the coming week(s).

SPY has support at the $607.03 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*), $604.38 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1), $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1) & $598.48/share (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1) price levels, with resistance at the $610.78/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: NULL, 0:0*) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF advanced +2.91% last week, as the tech-heavy index managed to fare the best of the major four index ETFs.

Their RSI is still advancing towards the overbought level & sits at 61.93 after the past three sessions, while their MACD is bullish, but its histogram has been muted since crossing over eight sessions ago.

Volumes were -36.76% lower than the prior year’s average levels (22,352,000 vs. 35,344,781), which is especially unnerving when you consider that the current past year’s average volume is -31.44% lower than than one year ago’s.

It’s also troubling to see volume this muted when 80% of the past week was advancing sessions for QQQ, indicating that there is a real lack of enthusiasm & folks are beginning to get slightly more worried.

Monday kicked QQQ’s week off on a bullish note, where the second weakest volume of the week’s session resulted in a bullish harami pattern, setting the stage for more gains in the near-term.

But not before Tuesday opened on a gap down, but quickly recovered to test the $530/share mark temporarily & managed to close higher, despite it being the weakest volume session of the week.

Things got a bit stranger come Wednesday, where on another gap down open QQQ opened below the 10 Day Moving Average’s support & tested the support of the 50 DMA, before rallying higher to close above the 10 DMA on the week’s second highest volume level, setting up the following two days of advancing sessions.

The fact that the 50 DMA was tested on the open after prices remaining above it for over a week is cause for caution & heightened awareness heading into this week.

Thursday’s gap up open also is cause for caution, just one day after the 50 DMA test, as despite having the strongest volume of the week, given how weak the week’s volume was is not convincing of any switches being flipped to the bullish side of things.

Friday also raises some eyebrows, as despite a new 52-week high being reached intraday, volumes were not strong enough to suggest a serious breakout to the upside particularly when compared to the two prior days’ levels.

Tuesday will play an important part in determining whether the three day rally lives on or if we see QQQ go back to oscillating around the 10 day moving average for the next week until NVDA earnings on 2/26/2025.

Like SPY, any meaningful upside movement in the near-term that will be sustainable will require an uptick in volume, especially given how robust the $538-539 window has held up among market participants.

Throwbacks should be watched for in the event of a breakout that does not occur on strong volumes.

In terms of should we see a consolidation range form from the run up of the second half of the week the 10 day moving average will become a key area to watch.

The reason being that once QQQ hits $534.99/share it is in a Seller dominated zone until it reaches $530/share, which is the zone currently housing the two support levels between the price & the 10 DMA.

Things will get tricky from there as then the next support level is the 50 day moving average, which also falls in a Seller zone that is on top of two additional Seller zones historically (see table below) with very sparse support along the way.

With few support levels to gain footing on & so much historic selling activity for the next -5.23% below Friday’s closing price it will make for good reason to watch those moving averages closely.

QQQ has support at the $533.82 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*), $531.24 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*), $528.15 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.86:1) & $522.34/share (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.18:1) price levels, with resistance at the $538.28/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.7:0*) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF declined -0.01% last week, as the small-cap index was the least favored of the four major index ETFs.

Their RSI is flat, just below the neutral 50 mark & sits currently at 49.47, while their MACD is bearish, but also flat after last week’s performance.

Volumes were -35.77% lower than the previous year’s average (18,670,000 vs. 29,066,135), showing that there is very much a “wait & see” attitude towards the small cap names, as last week IWM basically just tread water.

Compared to last year’s average volume, IWM’s current level is only -15.93% lower, which shows much greater participation than SPY or QQQ as noted above (2/18/2024’s note here).

Monday IWM started off on a troublesome foot, as the day formed a bearish harami pattern with Friday’s candle.

The session opened higher, but proceeded to break down below the 10 day moving average’s support before retracing back to close in-line with the 10 day moving average.

The next day opened on a gap down on stronger volume, but was able to close above its opening price.

Wednesday opened on yet another gap down, tested below the $222.50/share price mark but was able to run higher & closed above its open again, with the upper shadow indicating that there was some slight upside appetite, which was also confirmed by the week’s highest volume.

Thursday saw yet another gap open, but this time to the upside, which led to a retracement back to near Wednesday’s close, but ultimately IWM powered higher to close just beneath the 10 DMA’s resistance on the week’s second strongest volume.

Friday opened on a gap up in-line with the 50 day moving average’s resistance, broke out above it temporarily, before declining to close beneath the 10 DMA’s support.

IWM has a lot more local support levels than SPY or QQQ above did, which will help them in the near-term unless there is a broader market selloff that impacts all of the major indexes.

This is also important as their long-term trend line (200 DMA) is currently -4% below Friday’s closing price, and a retest of the long-term trend may not go as well as the one that occurred in early January.

In the coming week it appears like IWM will continue to oscillate around the 10 & 50 DMAs & move more in-line with DIA than SPY & QQQ as market participants digest a lot of uncertainty.

The table below can be used to assess the strength & weakness of the support/resistance levels that IWM encounters.

IWM has support at the $225.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $225.20 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $223.51 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) & $221.79/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) price levels, with resistance at the $226.33 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $226.50 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $226.99 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) & $227.17/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF crept up +0.6% last week, as the blue chip index was unable to find any traction to advance on.

Their RSI is trending back down towards the neutral 50 mark & sits currently at 56.43, while their MACD is bearish but has been flattening out after last week’s consolidation.

Volumes were -34.28% below their previous year’s average level (2,142,000 vs. 3,259,442), which is troubling when you consider how two of the three advancing sessions of the week were on extremely light volume compared to the two declining sessions.

DIA has managed to have the most stable Y-o-Y prior year’s average volume level, with the current one being just -6% below a year ago’s as market participants have clearly favored the security of blue chip stocks.

Much like IWM, DIA opened the week forming a bearish harami pattern with Friday’s hanging man candle, setting the stage for a week of uncertainty based on the unusually low volume.

Tuesday opened lower but was able to rally on another light volume session for form a bullish engulfing pattern that closed in-line with the 10 dya moving average.

Wednesday opened on a gap lower & tested lower before closing above its open, but as a spinning top candle indicating that there was still a great deal of uncertainty in the air.

Thursday the jumpiness continued with a gap up open that was in-line with the 10 DMA’s resistance, before testing lower to Wednesday’s close & then powering higher to close above the 10 DMA.

Friday market participants did not want to be carrying risk into the weekend & it resulted in a -0.33% declining day that closed just above the support of the 10 day moving average.

While DIA & IWM have moved in a more similar manner than SPY & QQQ, IWM has spent more time in consolidation ranges than DIA, leading to DIA having less support levels nearby.

This means it will be important to keep an eye on the volume sentiment at each of their price levels in the coming week(s), particularly as they are currently in a Seller dominated zone over the past 3-4 years at a rate of 1.25:1, which could aid in their price slipping.

Else, without much of an increase in volume it will be difficult to see any meaningful new all-time highs on the horizon that have staying power.

Expect prices to oscillate back & forth around the 10 DMA & between it & the 50 DMA in the coming week, barring any news that leads to a sell off, as DIA has shown resilience among the major indexes with market participants still wanting to buy blue chip names, just at muted levels of participation.

DIA has support at the $445.65 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.25:1), $443.51 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1), $437.42 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1) & $433.51/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.67:1) price levels, with resistance at the $450.08 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.4:0*) & $450.36/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.4:0*) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday the market will be closed for President’s Day, but Fed President Harker speaks at 9:30, Feg Governor Bowman speaks at 10:20 am & Fed Governor Waller speaks at 6 pm & there will be no earnings reports.

The Empire State Manufacturing Survey data is released Tuesday at 8:30 am, followed by Home Builder Confidence Index data at 10 am, Fed President Daly speaking at 10:20 am & Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Barr speaking at 1 pm.

Tuesday morning’s before the bell earnings reports include Allegion, Blackbaud, Chemours, Donnelly Financial, Expeditors International of Washington, Fluor, Franklin Electric, GeneDx, Genuine Parts, Hillman Solutions, Medtronic, NeoGenomics, Sapiens International, TRI Pointe Homes, Valmont Industries, Viking Holdings, Visteon, Vulcan Materials, Watsco & Waystar Holdings, with Andersons, Arista Networks, Bumble, Cadence Design, Celanese, Community Health, Comstock, CoStar Group, CVR Energy, Devon Energy, Element Solutions, EQT Corp., Flowserve, Halozyme Therapeutics, Ingevity, Innospec, International Flavors & Fragrances, James Hardie, La-Z-Boy, Magnolia Oil & Gas, Matador Resources, Occidental Petroleum, Penumbra, Perdoceo Education, RB Global, Rush Enterprises, Select Water Solutions, Shift4 Payments, Sonoco Products, Ternium, Toll Brothers & Unisys due to report after the closing bell.

Wednesday morning brings us Housing Starts & Building Permits data at 8:30 am, followed by the January FOMC Minutes at 2pm & Fed Vice Chair Jefferson speaking at 5 pm.

Amicus Therapeutics, Analog Devices, Appian, Bausch + Lomb, Centuri Holdings, Charles River, Cinemark, Clarivate, Clean Harbors, Enlight Renewable Energy, Enpro, Etsy, First Majestic Silver, Fiverr, Garmin, Gentherm, Gibraltar Industries, Gildan Activewear, Global-E Online, Healthcare Realty, Hudbay Minerals, Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Ionis Pharmaceuticals, KinderCare Learning, Krystal Biotech, Loar Holdings, Louisiana-Pacific, Materion, OGE Energy, OneSpaWorld, Parsons, PROG Holdings, ProPetro, StandardAero, Stepan, Travel + Leisure, Trimble, Wingstop, Wix.com & Wolverine World Wide report earnings before Wednesday’s opening bell, followed by Klaviyo, ACV Auctions, Alamos Gold, American States Water, American Water Works, Amplitude, ANSYS, B2Gold, Bausch Health, BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Carvana, CF Industries, Cheesecake Factory, Churchill Downs, Clearwater Analytics, Coeur Mining, Enovix, Equinox Gold, Exact Sciences, Genco Shipping & Trading, Grand Canyon Education, Herbalife Nutrition, Host Hotels, ICON plc, IMAX, Innovative Industrial Properties, Innovex International, Jackson Financial, Kaiser Aluminum, Manulife Financial, McGrath RentCorp, Mister Car Wash, NerdWallet, Nordson, Northern Oil & Gas, Oceaneering International, ONE Gas, OPENLANE, Orion Engineered Carbons, Pan Am Silver, Park Hotels & Resorts, PRA Group, Remitly Global, Sabra Health Care REIT, SM Energy, SolarEdge Technologies, Sturm Ruger, Tanger Factory, Toast, Trupanion, Vimeo, Vital Energy & Wheaton Precious Metals.

Initial Jobless Claims & Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Survey data are all released Thursday at 8:30 am, followed by Fed President Goolsbee speaking at 9:35 am, U.S. Leading Economic Indicators data at 10 am, Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Barr speaking at 2:30 pm & Fed Governor Kugler speaking at 5 pm.

Thursday morning kicks off with earnings from Walmart, Alight, Americold Realty Trust, Ardelyx, Autohome, Bandwidth, BigCommerce, Bilibili, Birkenstock Holding, Builders FirstSource, Cameco, Cenovus Energy, CenterPoint, Cheniere Energy, Choice Hotels, Constellium, Core Natural Resources, Cushman & Wakefield, Dana, DigitalBridge, Dun & Bradstreet, Endava, Enviri Corp, EPAM Systems, ESAB, Freshpet, FTI Consulting, Hasbro, IdaCorp, Insmed, Integer Holdings, Lamar Advertising, Laureate Education, Leonardo DRS, LKQ, Nutrien, Pediatrix Medical Group, Pool, Primo Brands Corp, Quanta Services, Reliance, Repligen, Sabre, Shake Shack, Southern, SpringWorks Therapeutics, Teck Resources, Tempur Sealy International, Trinity Industries, TripAdvisor, Unity Software, Upbound Group, Utz Brands & Wayfair before the opening bell, with Booking Holdings, ACCO Brands, Akamai Technologies, Alarm.com, Alliant Energy, American Homes 4 Rent, AMN Healthcare, Barings BDC, BJ Restaurants, Block, Boise Cascade, CarGurus, Con Edison, Dropbox, Employers Holdings, Evolent Health, eXp World Holdings, Fidelity National, Five9, Floor & Decor, Frontier Communications, Gaming and Leisure Properties, Glaukos, Globus Medical, Grid Dynamics, Guardant Health, indie Semiconductor, Insulet, iRhythm, Live Nation, MP Materials, Newmont Corp, NV5 Global, Rackspace Technology, Resideo, RingCentral, Rivian Automotive, Ryan Specialty Group, Ryman Hospitality, Select Medical, Sprouts Farmers Market, Texas Roadhouse, Universal Display, VICI Properties, Vicor & World Kinect all due to report after the session’s close.

Friday the week winds down with S&P Flash U.S. Services PMI & S&P Flash U.S. Manufacturing PMI data at 9:35 am, followed by Consumer Sentiment (final) & Existing Home Sales at 10 am, and Fed Vice Chairman Jefferson & Fed President Daly speaking at 11:30 am.

Atmus Filtration Technologies, Balchem, Brady, Oil States, Sunstone Hotel, Telephone & Data, TXNM Energy & Uniti Group are all due to report earnings on Friday morning before the session’s open.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF fell -1.01% last week, while the VIX closed at 16.43, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.04% & an implied one month move of +/-4.75%.

Their RSI is trending down towards the neutral level & sits currently at 53.91, while their MACD has curled over bearishly & looks set for a bearish crossover by the end of Tuesday’s session.

Volumes were -5.93% lower than the previous year’s average level (51,584,000 vs. 54,836,494), which is weak participation, but validates that there is indeed some risk aversion settling into stock prices in the near-term.

Monday, the week kicked off on a gap down that opened just below the resistance of the 50 day moving average, but throughout the day market participants rushed back in & managed to push SPY above both the 50 & 10 day moving averages.

Seller volume was the second highest it’s been so far in 2025, indicating that there was a severe urgency to sell SPY & its component stocks, but that there was also quite a few folks hopping back into the pool as well, given that the day ended higher than it opened.

Tuesday showed a glimmer of strength, where on the third highest volume of the week SPY managed to grind higher, but not without testing back below the 10 DMA’s support briefly.

Wednesday flashed the warning signals again, when on the week’s lightest volume SPY opened lower, tested again below the 10 DMA, only to settle in line with it’s support & form a bearish harami pattern with Tuesday’s candle.

Thursday managed to open higher, but again tested below the 10 DMA’s support before powering higher to close as an up day on light volume, indicating that there was not much strength of sentiment behind the move.

The spinning top candle also added a greater sense of uncertainty to SPY’s near-term performance, but the 10 day moving average continued to be straddled & a key area to watch.

Friday saw the brakes get slammed, as SPY opened higher, tested the $610/share limit, before being sent down & breaking through the support of the 10 DMA to close below it on a -0.53% session.

Friday’s volume was the second highest of the week, and third highest of the year, indicating that there was unease among market participants.

It should also be noted that Friday’s candle formed a bearish engulfing pattern with Thursday’s, another bit of negative near-term sentiment.

The coming week holds a plethora of earnings calls, with some of the most notable coming from Amazon, Alphabet & Disney.

Prices look ready to consolidate between the 10 & 50 DMAs until given a direction to break out in, which will likely come from the earnings reports of the week, else from any of the number of Fed speakers that are scheduled for the coming days.

As noted in prior weeks’ notes, any move to the upside will require a great deal of advancing volume to have sticking power, particularly as SPY is so close to all-time highs.

To the downside, if the 50 day moving average’s support doesn’t hold up, SPY may have some trouble as there are no support levels until $584.15/share.

The reason that this is troublesome is that while the price zones between there & Friday’s close are historically dominated by Buyers, the $580-584.99/share price zone is Seller dominated over the past 2-3 years, at a rate of 2.1:1.

If we see that break down there is not much strength of historic buyers until the $580-584.99/share price level, which contains two support levels.

Volume will be a key factor to watch in any market movement, as at these price levels it will be important to have confirmation by active market participation, as even in the event of a consolidation range continuing all week it will give clues into which way market participants are leaning, be it more risk-on or risk-off.

The chart below gives insight into volume sentiment at the price levels SPY has traded at over the past 2-3 years.

SPY has support at the $596.43 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1), $580.91 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1) & $575.35/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.08:1) price levels, with resistance at the $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1), $603.73 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1), $607.03 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*) & $610.78/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: NULL, 0:0*) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF declined -1.39% last week, as investors were most weary of the tech-heavy index out of the four major ETFs.

Their RSI has flattened out just above the neutral 50 mark at 52.07, while their MACD is still bullish but has also flattened out & their histogram indicates that there will be a bearish crossover by Tuesday.

Volumes were +3.59% higher than the previous year’s average (37,378,000 vs. 36,082,271), which is a slight cause for concern given that the week ultimately resulted in declines & the top two highest volume sessions were declining.

Much like SPY, QQQ opened the week on a gap down on the highest volume of the week, setting the stage for near-term weakness to set in.

QQQ however, opened below the 10 & 50 day moving averages, temporarily broke above them, before closing below both, but higher than the day opened, indicating that market participants were willing to accept some risk as the session went on.

Tuesday opened higher, retraced down almost to Monday’s opening level, before tearing above the 50 day moving average’s resistance & the 10 DMA’s resistance & managed to settle for the day atop both, with a small upper shadow indicating that there was a slight bit of more upside appetite.

On Wednesday reality set in to remind QQQ investors that it’s not out of the woods just yet, as the session opened slightly higher, before tumbling below the 10 day moving average’s support, going so far down as to test the 50 day moving average, before regaining some of its losses to close below the 10 DMA.

Volume on Wednesday was the lightest of the week, which is a bit alarming when you consider the wide range of prices that were touched intraday, as well as the fact that there were multiple tests & retests of the 10 & 50 DMAs.

Thursday the risk off sentiment continued, as despite gapping higher on the open, the day resulted in a spinning top candle that closed lower than its open, indicating that there was a bit on uneasiness in the market for QQQ, which when coupled with the week’s second lowest volume becomes even more apparent.

Friday, much like SPY, QQQ formed a bearish engulfing pattern after opening on a gap up, temporarily testing higher, before dropping to below the support of the 10 day moving average & closing below it.

Volume was second highest for the week on Friday, which when paired with Monday’s highest volume of the week session paints a bit of a bleak picture for QQQ in the near-term.

Much like SPY, this week expect to see QQQ oscillate between the support of the 50 day moving average & the resistance of the 10 day moving average until a catalyst pushes it to break out either up or down.

For any staying power to an upside move there will need to be volume as strong as this past week, if not stronger, especially given that their price is currently in a Seller dominated zone historically.

This will require a bit of an extra push to continue prices moving higher from, as the next resistance levels after the 10 DMA are all in Seller dominated zone as well, so there will need to be a great deal of added enthusiasm for QQQ to continue higher.

To the downside, there’s Seller pressure for the next -2.35% before the Buyers have historically stepped in.

However, if the $508.47/share level breaks down there will be additional losses given that the next support level doesn’t occur until $499.70.

QQQ has support at the $517.82 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.33:1), $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $510.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1) & $508.47/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.6:1) price levels, with resistance at the $524.25 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.18:1), $531.24 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*), $533.82 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*) & $538.28/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.7:0*) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF dropped -0.97% last week, as even small cap names were shunned by market participants.

Their RSI is about to cross down through the neutral 50 level & currently is at 50.62, while their MACD has curled over bearishly & should cross through the signal line by mid-week.

Volumes were -16.66% lower than the prior year’s average (25,104,000 vs. 30,121,000), as there was muted participation among investors for IWM.

Monday began on a cautious note, as the day tested the 10 day moving average’s support, as well as the 50 day moving average’s resistance, but ultimately settled as a spinning top candle on the second highest volume of the week after opening on a gap down.

Tuesday opened higher, tested higher, then temporarily went below the support of the 10 day moving average, in a session that closed as a doji on the week’s lowest level of volume.

This signaled that there was bearish sentiment on the horizon, but prices managed to close above the 10 DMA.

Wednesday this theme of weakness carried on, as on lackluster volume the day resulted in a high wave spinning top candle that opened in line with the 10 DMA, but closed below it, indicating that there was a lot of confusion and speculation about where to value IWM, but at the end of the day the result was resoundingly lower.

Thursday opened on a gap higher, but uneasiness was abound as the high wave candle broke above the 50 DMA’s resistance & below the 20 DMA’s support, only to close in-line with its opening price.

Friday opened on a gap higher & went above the 50 DMA again & also briefly crossed $230/share again, but ultimately was unable to find any footing & on the week’s strongest volume IWM declined through the 10 DMA’s support to close below it.

For this coming week expect to see IWM continue to straddle the 10 day moving average until there is a catalyst that pushes it higher or lower.

Much like SPY & QQQ, any upside movement will require a large increase in volume, as IWM is currently in a Seller dominated zone & will enter another in the event that they advance +2.44%.

A unique trouble for IWM though is that in this current price zone sit the next four resistance levels & the $227.17-18 mark will require a large push to break through & stay above.

To the downside there is some Buyer pressure once the $23.99 share price is hit, but if IWM loses -4.63% from Friday’s close it will find itself in another Seller zone & the strength of the Buyers on the two zones in between will become more diluted (unless they are completely gapped over, which will present a unique set of challenges).

Also, the current price is 5.2% above the long-term trend (200 DMA) & that will become something to begin thinking about in the next two weeks, especially if there is no catalyst higher, as the 200 DMA is currently in a Seller dominated zone 1.29:1, which increases the risk of the long-term trend breaking down for IWM.

IWM has support at the $225.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $225.20 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $223.51 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) & $221.04/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) price levels, with resistance at the $226.50 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $227.17 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $227.18 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) & $227.61/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF advanced +0.29% last week, as the blue chip index was the only major index that market participants viewed favorably.

Their RSI is trending back towards neutral after flirting with the overbought 70 level & sits currently at 61.43, while their MACD has curled over bearishly & their histogram has begun to wane, indicating that there is likely going to be a bearish crossover by mid-week.

Volumes were -16.99% lower than the prior year’s average level (2,738,000 vs. 3,298,566), which makes the small weekly gain rather insignificant.

Most of DIA’s gains for the week can be attributed to Monday’s performance, which resulted in a bullish engulfing candle that set up the rest of the week for a bit of floundering & consolidation.

Monday had the highest volume of the week, which also speaks to the true strength of the move, as there was not much eagerness for market participants to ride the wave higher during the rest of the week.

Tuesday opened on a gap higher, but the enthusiasm waned quickly as the week’s lightest volume session pushed higher, but was rejected at the $450/share price level & closed at $448.41.

Wednesday the cracks began to show in DIA, as while the day’s candle did not result in a bearish engulfing pattern, it was close to one & ultimately the day ended as a declining spinning top on low volume, showing a severe level of confusion lack of interest among market participants.

Thursday resulted in a bullish engulfing candle, but again the volume came in very underwhelming & yet again the $450/share price level held up, making a run at the all-time high seem less & less likely.

Friday wiped any potential enthusiasm away though, with a gap up open that led to a -0.76% declining session on the week’s second highest volume, as the all-time high held up & the day’s candle created a bearish engulfing pattern.

This week all eyes will be on whether or not the all-time high holds up or if the $450/share gets rejected once & for all & a double top forms.

Should this occur, keep in mind that DIA’s current price & first level of support (the 10 DMA) are both in a Seller dominated zone.

While Buyers have historically stepped in for the next -3.9% from Friday’s closing price, if the 50 day moving average breaks down the $428.24/share price level will become the next-most important place to watch, as it leads into another historically Seller dominated zone (3:1).

Without a major surge in volume & should there be no major splashes due to earnings, expect prices to consolidate between the 10 & 50 day moving averages until there is a reason for a breakout.

Once there is a breakout, ensure that there is proper volume supporting the move, given that DIA is just off of all-time highs.

DIA has support at the $444.25 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.25:1), $443.15 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1), $436.53 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.6:1) & $433.51/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.67:1) price levels, with resistance at the $450.08/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.4:0*) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday the week begins with S&P Final U.S. Manufacturing PMI data at 9:45 am, followed by Construction Spending & ISM Manufacturing data at 10 am & Fed President Bostic speaking at 12 pm.

IDEXX Laboratories, Napco Security Systems, Saia, Twist Bioscience & Tyson Foods all report earnings before Monday’s opening bell, with AECOM, BellRing Brands, Cabot, Capital Southwest, Clorox, Equity Residential, Fabrinet, Healthpeak Properties, J&J Snack Foods, Kforce, Kyndryl, MGIC Investment, NJ Resources, NXP Semiconductors, Palantir Technologies, Rambus, Tempus AI & Woodward scheduled to report after the session’s close.

Job Openings & Factory Orders data are released Tuesday at 10 am, followed by Fed President Bostic speaking on Housing at 11 am, Fed President Daly speaking at 2 pm & Fed Vice Chairman Jefferson speaking at 7:30 pm.

Tuesday morning’s earnings calls include Amcor, Ametek, Aramark, Archer-Daniels-Midland, ATI Inc., Atkore International, Ball Corp, Berry Global, Centene, CNH Industrial, Colliers International Group, Cummins, Energizer, Enterprise Products, Estee Lauder, Ferrari, Fox Corp, Gartner, Graphic Packaging, Hamilton Lane, Hubbell, Ingredion, InMode, Jacobs Solutions, Kiniksa Pharmaceuticals, KKR, Lancaster Colony, Marathon Petroleum, Merck, MPLX LP, MSG Sports, Oaktree Specialty Lending Corp, PayPal Holdings, Pentair, PepsiCo, Pfizer, PJT Partners, Silicon Labs, Spotify Technology, Transdigm Group, UBS, UL Solutions, WEC Energy Group, Willis Towers Watson & Xylem, before Alphabet, 8×8, A10 Networks, Advanced Micro Devices, Allegiant Travel, Amdocs, American Financial Group, Amgen, Artisan Partners Asset Management, Aspen Technology, Atmos Energy, AZEK, Carlisle Companies, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Cirrus Logic, Columbia Sportswear, Douglas Emmett, DXC Technology, Electronic Arts, Enova International, Enphase Energy, Essex Property, Fair Isaac, FMC Corp, Golub Capital, H & R Block, Hanover Insurance, ICHOR Corp, IDEX Corp, Intapp, Jack Henry, Juniper Networks, Kulicke & Soffa, Lumen Technologies, Match Group, Mattel, Mercury, Modine Manufacturing, Mondelez International, Mueller Water, NOV Inc., O-I Glass, Omnicom, Oscar Health, Prudential, Rush Enterprises, Simon Properties, Skyline Champion, Snap, Unum Group, Varonis Systems, Veralto, Voya Financial, Western Union & Zurn Elkay Water Solutions report following the session’s closing bell.

Wednesday morning features ADP Employment data at 8:15, followed by U.S. Trade Deficit data at 8:30 am, Fed President Barkin speaking at 9 am, S&P Final U.S. Services PMI data at 9:45 am, ISM Services data at 10 am, Fed President Goolsbee speaking at 1 pm, Fed Governor Bowman speaking at 3 pm & Fed Vice Chairman Jefferson speaking at 7:30 pm.

Walt Disney, Ares Capital, Ares Management, ATS Corp, Azenta, Bio-Techne, Boston Scientific, Bunge, Capri Holdings, CDW, Cencora, Centuri Holdings, Criteo, Dayforce, Emerson, Evercore, FirstService, Fiserv, Gildan Activewear, GlaxoSmithKline, Griffon, Harley-Davidson, Illinois Tool Works, Johnson Controls, Kennametal, KinderCare Learning Companies, New York Times, Old Dominion Freight Line, Performance Food Group, Reynolds Consumer Products, RXO, South Bow, Spire, StandardAero, Stanley Black & Decker, T. Rowe Price, Timken, Uber Technologies, Vishay & Yum! Brands are all due to report earnings before Wednesday’s opening bell, followed by Aflac, Align Technology, Allstate, Alpha and Omega Semiconductor, Amentum Holdings, Arm Holdings, ASGN Inc, AvalonBay, Black Hills, BrightView, Central Garden, Cognizant Technology Solutions, Coherent, CONMED, Corpay, Corteva, Crown Holdings, CSG Systems, Curbline Properties, Deluxe, DHT, Digi International, Digital Turbine, Enersys, Envista, Equitable Holdings, First Industrial Realty, Ford Motor, FormFactor, Franco-Nevada, Globe Life, Hillenbrand, Hologic, Horace Mann, Impinj, Kemper, LandBridge, LiveRamp, Manulife Financial, McKesson, MetLife, MicroStrategy, Mid-America Apartment Communities, Moelis, Molina Healthcare, Murphy USA, Netgear, News Corp., O’Reilly Automotive, Omega Healthcare Investors, Paycor, PTC, Qiagen, Radian Group, Rayonier, Regal Rexnord, Rexford Industrial Realty, Safehold, Silicon Motion, SiTime, Skyworks Solutions, Steris, Stewart Information Services, Suncor Energy, Symbotic, Tenable Holdings, TTM Technologies, UDR, UGI Corp, Viking Therapeutics & WEX after the session’s close.

Initial Jobless Claims & U.S. Productivity data are released Thursday at 8:30 am, followed by Fed Governor Waller speaking at 2:30 pm & Fed President Logan speaking at 5:10 pm.

Thursday morning’s earnings calls include Advanced Drainage Systems, AGCO Corp, Air Products and Chemicals, AllianceBernstein, Aptiv, ArcelorMittal, Arrow Electronics, AstraZeneca, BCE Inc, Becton Dickinson, Belden, BorgWarner, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Canada Goose, Clearfield, CMS Energy, ConocoPhillips, Eli Lilly, Embecta, Entegris, Equifax, Equinox Gold, First Majestic Silver, Gates Industrial, Haemonetics, Hershey Foods, Hilton, Honeywell, Huntington Ingalls, Insight Enterprises, InterDigital, IQVIA, ITT, Kellanova, Kelly Services, Kenvue, Labcorp Holdings, Lightspeed, Lincoln National, Linde, MACOM Technology Solutions, MarketAxess, MasterCraft, MDU Resources, nVent Electric, Omnicell, Open Text, Patrick Industries, Peabody Energy, Peloton Interactive, Prestige Consumer, Ralph Lauren, Roblox, Snap-On, Spectrum Brands, Tapestry, Thomson Reuters, Tradeweb Markets, Under Armour, Valvoline, Warner Music Group, Xcel Energy, XPO, Yum China & Zimmer Biomet, beforeAffirm Holdings, Amazon, AptarGroup, Bill.com, Boyd Gaming, Camden Property, Cloudflare, CNO Financial, COPT Defense Properties, Cousins Properties, Doximity, e.l.f. Beauty, EastGroup, Encompass Health, ESCO Technologies, Expedia Group, Exponent, Fortinet, Fortune Brands Innovations, Genpact, GoPro, Hub Group, Illumina, Innovex International, Leslie’s, Lions Gate Entertainment, Lumentum, Mettler-Toledo, Microchip, Minerals Technologies, Mohawk Industries, Monolithic Power, NMI Holdings, Onto Innovation, Paylocity, Phillips Edison, Pinterest, Post, Powell Industries, Principal Financial Group, PROS Holdings, Qualys, QuinStreet, Regency Centers, Reinsurance Group of America, Skechers USA, Sonos, SS&C Technologies, StepStone Group, Synaptics, Take-Two Interactive Software, Varex Imaging, VeriSign, Victory Capital, WEBTOON Entertainment, Werner Enterprises, Wheaton Precious Metals report following the session’s close.

Friday the week winds down with U.S. Employment Report, U.S. Unemployment Rate, U.S. Hourly Wages & Hourly Wages Year-over-Year data at 8:30 am, followed by Fed Governor Bowman speaking at 9:25 am, Wholesale Inventories data & Consumer Sentiment (prelim) at 10 am & Consumer Credit data at 3 pm.

Avantor, Cboe Global Markets, Construction Partners, Flowers Foods, Fortive, Frontier Group Holdings, Green Plains, Kimco Realty, Newell Brands, Perella Weinberg Partners, Plains All American, Protolabs & Telus all report earnings before Friday morning’s opening bell.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF gained +2.94% last week, while the VIX closed at 15.97, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.01% & an implied one month move of +/-4.62%, following the first full week of trading of the past four weeks.

Their RSI crossed the neutral level of 50 after Wednesday’s gap up session, while their MACD crossed over bullishly on Friday.

Volumes were -9.36% lower than the prior year’s average (50,924,000 vs. 54,180,870), which casts the gains of the week in a suspicious light, given that the highest volume advancing days came on sessions with gap ups & leave windows to be filled.

Monday saw the temporary recovery from the prior week kick off, but note the low volume of the day, indicating that there was not enough conviction behind the move to view it as a true, robust reversal.

Tuesday continued this theme, as the session opened on a gap up, but was unable to test much higher & SPY sunk to the middle of Monday’s range, before rallying back to close above Monday’s close, but below it’s own opening price.

This intraday volatility paired with the low volume attached with it don’t paint a picture of a healthy bull run & signal that there was a bit of intraday profit taking with a surge higher heading into the end of the session.

Wednesday opened on a gap up above the 10 day moving average’s resistance, saw a small amount of downside test before continuing higher to temporarily break above the 50 day moving average’s resistance & settling in-line with the 50 DMA.

On Thursday, SPY opened on another gap up that was above the 50 day moving average’s resistance, but that profits were quickly taken from, forcing the day lower & closing below the 50 DMA.

A couple of things of note on Thursday: firstly, the lower shadow indicates that there was some more appetite lower for SPY, and the other is that all of this price action took place on the week’s lowest volume.

Friday the week left off on a rather ominous note & cast uncertainty on SPY’s future week(s).

On another gap up, SPY managed to briefly break out above the $598.16/share resistance level, but it did not sustain & the day ended closing as a doji candle on the week’s highest volume.

This indicates that there was a bit of profit taking, as well as some tug of war between the bulls & bears.

Looking ahead to the upcoming shortened week due to MLK Jr. Day, it’s worth taking a look at the difference between SPY & each of the following index ETF’s week-over-week (last week’s note is here), as this week again will be determined largely by volume.

The $598.16/share resistance level will play an important role in the week ahead, as prices will need to break through it to continue SPY’s climb higher.

This falls in a price zone that has typically been dominated by Buyers at a rate of 2.5:1 over the past ~2 years, but there has not been much declining pressure here & we may see sellers step up to block this move.

It will also be important to keep an eye on the 10 day moving average as it moves towards the 50 DMA to see if a crossover inspires any more upwards movement in SPY, as a ~2% advance has it brushing up against its all-time high.

Again, this will require an uptick in volume in order to be sustainable, especially given the number of windows that were created by gaps last week that will eventually need to be filled.

If the support of the 10 & 50 DMAs does break down & prices reach the $589.99/share level we may see further declines down to the $579.99/share level, as the Buyers who dominate the $585-589.99 price zone have seen limited pressure from Sellers & the %580-584.99/share price zone is historically dominated by Sellers 2.1:1.

There’s not a ton of economic data this week, but there are a lot of earnings announcements which are more likely to drive SPY’s direction this week.

If neither of the two situations above occur, it will most likely be a week of SPY straddling & oscillating around the 10 DMA while awaiting the next large clue as to which way market participants are feeling.

SPY has support at the $593.95 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.2:1), $589.15 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.4:0*), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1) & $581.90/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1) price levels, with resistance at the $598.16 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1) & $607.03/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF added +2.87% last week, as the least favored of the major four index ETFs.

Their RSI crossed over the neutral 50 mark after Wednesday’s gap up session, while their MACD is still bearish, but looks set to cross over bullishly during Tuesday’s session.

Volumes were -1.81% lower than the prior year’s average (36,092,000 vs. 36,757,391), which much like SPY tells of there being some trouble brewing for readers to be aware of.

Last week QQQ fell -2.2% on volume that was -2.3% lower than the prior year, while this week there was slightly more participation among investors, but gains mostly came on the back of Wednesday & Friday’s opening gap ups.

Monday QQQ’s week began on a gap down that managed to break below the $500/share mark briefly, before rallying higher to close above $505/share & an upper shadow showing that there was some more appetite for higher prices.

Given that this day had the second lowest volume of the week & was by no means noteworthy in terms of volume compared to the past 5+ months, it doesn’t have sturdy legs as a reversal point & needs to provide more proof in terms of the change of general sentiment in the market.

Tuesday opened on a gap up, tested higher, but ultimately retraced almost all of Monday’s candle’s real body’s price range before closing just below Monday’s closing price.

This should be cause for concern as there was more volume on Tuesday than Monday, reflecting in part some short-term profit taking, but also some market participants slowly jumping back into the pool.

Note that on Tuesday, both the 10 & 50 DMAs’ resistance levels were neck & neck & above QQQ’s price, before Wednesday’s gap up open occurred right in-line with both levels, and despite there being a retest & breakdown of their support levels, it proved temporary as prices powered higher throughout the session.

Wednesday resulted in the second highest volume of the week, but when compared to Friday’s volume (highest day) it was nothing to write home about, despite the good news pouring in in terms of big banks’ earnings results.

Recall too that financial stocks are not typically included in QQQ, which should add an added bit of skepticism about the staying power behind the day’s move.

Thursday opened on another gap higher, but sunk back down to sit in-line with the support of the 10 & 50 day moving averages, which were still braided together.

None of the above spell out a particularly strong outlook, or much in terms of optimism, which makes Friday’s performance all the more important.

Friday opened on a gap up, and despite the small upper shadow on the session’s candle is a hanging man candle, indicating that there is uncertainty & bearishness still in the air.

While it took the week’s highest volume award, Friday’s session was quite the game of tug of war between bulls & bears, where prices failed to reach the $525/share level, tested to the downside to break down the support of both the 10 & 50 day moving averages, only to close at $521.74, but lower than its opening price ($522.85).

Options expiration may have contributed to these swings & some covering/squeezing may have also played a factor, but there is not an overwhelming amount of confidence out there at the moment.

QQQ’s week ahead looks similar, except that to the upside they’ll need ~3% to challenge their all-time high, but an uptick in advancing volume will be essential for it to be sustainable.

They’ll need to break above the $525/share price level as well to find stable footing, as all of the prices for the next -2.25% lower are dominated by sellers historically, which would lead to further breakdowns for QQQ & push their price below the support of the 10 & 50 day moving averages.

If the $514.75 support breaks down it will lead to them being challenged, and if they break down expect to see a retest of the $508.47 price level.

Otherwise, much like SPY, there will likely be further consolidation & oscillation around the 10 & 50 day moving averages until there is a major catalyst to the up or downside, as this is a shortened, quiet week.

QQQ has support at the $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $514.65 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $514.29 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1) & $508.47/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.6:1) price levels, with resistance at the $531.24 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*) & $538.28/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: 0.7:0*) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF advanced +3.98%, as the small cap index was the most favored among market participants out of the major four index ETFs.

Their RSI crossed over above their neutral 50 mark & sits at 51.33 after Wednesday’s gap up session, while their MACD crossed over bullishly on Thursday.

Volumes were -14.6% lower than the prior year’s average (26,390,000 vs. 30,902,213), which also tells a tale of uncertainty that could well result in weakness in the coming week(s).

It is worth noting before we proceed that IWM’s chart is unique in that it contains no proper declining sessions compared to SPY & QQQ, however, there’s still a lot that stands to be improved from a place of market confidence for the small-cap index.

Firstly, on Monday IWM opened on a gap down, wound up declining to test the long-term trend’s support level a the 200 day moving average, before advancing higher to close above the prior Friday’s close.

While the session had the second highest volume of the week, the small upper shadow combined with the overall lackluster volume compared to the previous year’s average level is reason to carry caution into the coming week.

Tuesday featured a gap up open to near the $220/share price level, that tested below the $217.50 price level intraday, as well as above the $220/share level before ultimately settling up for an advancing session, but closed as a spinning top, indicating indecision.

The size of the upper shadow on Tuesday’s candle does not categorize it necessarily as a hanging man, but it certainly looks similar.

Wednesday IWM gapped up on the open to above the resistance of the 10 day moving average & above the $225/share mark on the highest volume of the week, but left reason for concern still for market participants.

Throughout the day the bulls & bears battled it out, at times forcing prices to near as low as $222.50/share & while the session closed above the day’s low, it was below the opening price, indicating that there was still quite a bit of doubt circulating IWM & its component stocks.

Thursday this theme continued, as volumes plunged to the lowest level of the week & while the session opened higher & did advance, it resulted in a spinning top high wave candle, marking a lot of uncertainty among market participants.

The lows of Thursday were lower than Wednesday’s lows & their high was lower than Wednesday’s opening price, which is a reason to tread cautiously.

The spinning top also signifies indecision & the high waves of the upper/lower shadows also show that there was a lot of reshuffling of cards amongst players, and that type of repositioning the day before an option’s expiration day is always cause for concern.

Friday couldn’t shake this theme, as the open was on a gap up higher & prices eroded all day until the $225/share mark was temporarily broken through, but prices were propped back up to close at $225.46/share to end the week, which is lower than the opening price of $226.93.

IWM will face an interesting week, as its price currently sits in a price zone that is Seller dominated 3:1, and all of the next four resistance levels are in the same zone.

In the event it gets the volume to break above the $227.17-18 levels it’ll be in a Buyer dominated zone 5:1 where it will need to break above the resistance of the 50 day moving average.

To the downside it has Buyer dominated support levels for the next -4.2%, but if you look at their past year’s chart there hasn’t been much downside testing against these levels, which might occur in the wake of some negative earnings data this week or possible bad economic data next week.

It’s also worth noting that IWM’s long-term trend line (200 DMA) is only ~5% from their closing price on Friday, which resides in a Seller dominated zone & could make for an interesting retest should prices break down.

Otherwise, expect oscillations between the 10 & 50 DMAs until an upside or downside catalyst.

IWM has support at the $225.20 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $223.51 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1), $222.12 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) & $221.04/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) price levels, with resistance at the $225.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $226.50 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $227.17 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) & $227.18/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF was up +3.67% for the week last week.

Their RSI has just crossed up above the neutral 50 level & sits at 56.5 following Wednesday & Friday’s gap ups, while their MACD crossed over bullishly on Wednesday.

Volumes were -12.7% lower than the previous year’s average (2,922,000 vs. 3,347,075), which should be noted given that most of the week’s session’s were advances that opened on gap ups, as this exposes weakness in the moves.

Monday DIA opened lower, but rallied on the week’s weakest volumes to close near Friday’s opening price, but the volume weakness was not convincing that there was a true reversal at play.

Tuesday opened on a gap higher to be in-line with the 10 day moving average, but retraced lower throughout the session to below Monday’s close before rallying back to close as a hanging man candle, indicating that there was not particularly strong sentiment abound.

Wednesday opened on a gap higher on the week’s strongest volume, but closed as a spinning top candle, indicating uncertainty among investors, and a great deal of it.

The primary takeaway is that the $430/share level held up & remained resilient, but prices were not able to test the 50 day moving average’s resistance.

Thursday is when things began to look murky, as the session opened slightly lower than Wednesday’s close, and closed in-line with its opening price, forming another spinning top & being a penny shy of a bearish harami candle.

It’s worth noting too that this declining volume was the second lowest of the week, so there was an extreme air of caution.

Friday also flashed warning signs, as the session opened on a gap up to just below the 50 day moving average, temporarily broke out above it, before settling back down to form a gravestone doji candle.

This will be an area to keep an eye on this week, as while their current price zone & the one below it are historically Buyer dominated, they have faced limited downside tests & Friday’s candle doesn’t indicate that there was enough upwards sentiment for DIA.

Another area to watch for DIA is the long-term trend line, which is currently ~6.2% below Friday’s closing price & climbing higher.

This week prices are likely to oscillate around between the 10 & 50 day moving averages, barring some catalyst to the upside or downside.

If the 10 DMA gets retested it is currently in a zone dominated by Sellers 3:1, which would put the $421.56/share support level in DIA’s crosshairs as an important support point.

DIA has support at the $434.71 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.67:1), $431.53 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5:1), $428.24 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5:1) & $427.03/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) price levels, with resistance at the $443.15 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1) & $450.08/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.4:0*) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday there is no economic data due to release as it is Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

There is also no data currently scheduled for release on Tuesday, 1/21/25.

Tuesday morning’s earnings reports feature 3M, Charles Schwab, Community Financial System, D.R. Horton, FB Financial, Fifth Third Bancorp, KeyCorp, New Oriental Education & Technology, Old National Bancorp, Peoples Bancorp, Progressive & Prologis, with Netflix, Agilysys, Canadian National Railway, Capital One Financial, Fulton Financial, Hancock Whitney, Interactive Brokers, Pathward Financial, Pinnacle Financial Partners, Progress Software, RBB Bancorp, Seagate Technology, Simmons First National, United Airlines, Wintrust Financial & Zions Bancorp scheduled to report after the closing bell.

U.S. Leading Economic Indicators are released Wednesday morning at 10 am.

Wednesday morning’s earnings reports include GE Vernova, Abbott Laboratories, Ally Financial, Amphenol, BankUnited, Comerica, Commerce Bancshares, F.N.B. Corp, Halliburton, Johnson & Johnson, OFG Bancorp, Procter & Gamble, TE Connectivity, Textron, Travelers & United Community Banks, with Alcoa, CACI International, Cadence Bank, Canadian Pacific Kansas City Ltd., Cathay Bancorp, Celestica, Discover Financial Services, Hexcel, Kinder Morgan, Knight-Swift Transportation, National Bank, Plexus, RLI Corp, SL Green Realty, Steel Dynamics, Waste Connections & WesBanco all due to report after the session’s close.

Thursday kicks off with Initial Jobless Claims data at 8:30 am.

Alaska Air Group, American Airlines, Atlantic Union Bankshares, Banc of California, Elevance Health, First Bancorp, FirstService, Freeport-McMoRan, GATX, GE Aerospace, McCormick, Northern Trust, Pacific Premier, Rogers Communications, Teck Resources, Texas Capital, Union Pacific, Valley National & WNS all report earnings on Thursday morning, followed by Associated Banc-Corp, Columbia Banking, CSX, Customers Bancorp, East West Banc, First Financial Bancorp, Glacier Bancorp, Intuitive Surgical, Sallie Mae, South State & Texas Instruments after the closing bell.

S&P Flash U.S. Services PMI & S&P flash U.S. Manufacturing PMI are scheduled for release Friday at 9:45 am, followed by Existing Home Sales & Consumer Sentiment at 10 am.

Friday morning’s earnings reports feature American Express, HCA, Lakeland Financial, NextEra Energy, Northwest Bancshares & Verizon Communications.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF finished the third consecutive four day shortened week -1.94%, while the VIX closed at 19.54, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.23% & an implied one month move of +/-5.65%.

Their RSI is trending down closer to oversold territory & sits currently at 39.34, while their MACD continues bearishly lower as it has been since early December.

Volumes were +1.03% above the previous year’s average level (57,120,000 vs. 56,537,421), which should cause concern for market participants, given that most of the volume was declining & it was in a short week.

Also, as has been noted over the past nine months, volumes as a whole for all of the major index ETFs for the most part have been markedly lower since April 19,2024, so the fact that this week was slightly above average SPY volume is really not a great sign.

Monday set the tone for a week of continued weakness for SPY, as a light volume session opened on a gap up above the 10 & 50 day moving averages’ resistance, only to result in a spinning top candle, who closed lower than it opened, in a move that does not inspire confidence.

It’s upper shadow showed that there was some interest in the $600/share mark at one point during the day, but that profits were quickly taken & there was a test of the 10 DMA’s support that held up for the day.

There was quite a bit of uncertainty floating around in SPY & its components in a shortened week before earnings season begins again.

Tuesday the floor fell out, as SPY opened higher, but proceeded to sink below both the 10 & 50 day moving averages’ support & continue lower, with the lower shadow indicating that there was still some appetite to push prices lower than where they wound up closing at, which occurred on the second highest volume of the week.

People were clearly deciding it time to cash in their chips & take their profits given the higher than normal volume of the week noted above.

Wednesday has similar low volumes as Monday, and the day’s candle continued painting the grim outlook for SPY, as while the day opened higher, it quickly showed that investors had their eyes set on the $585/share level & temporarily dropped that low before being squeezed higher to close the day with a slight advance.

It should be noted that the 10 DMA crossed bearishly through the 50 DMA on Wednesday as well, signaling that there will be a rocky couple of weeks ahead of us for SPY.

Friday confirmed that, when the week’s highest volume session came on a declining day that opened above $585, but barreled down to close at $580.49 by the end of the day, with the lower shadow indicating that there was appetite for SPY <$580/share.

In terms of what to watch for this week, much of last week’s same themes continue, as there are little upside catalysts, unless earnings reports mid-week from the big banks stun investors positively, which seems increasingly less likely.

Even should we get a pleasant surprise, the current upside view is hinged upon the 10 & 50 DMAs’ resistance, which are now both bearing down on price as investors have already signaled that they don’t mind pushing SPY into the $575 price block.

Another thing to be mindful of is that over the past ~2 years SPY when trading between $580-584.99/share has been dominated by Sellers at the rate of 2.1:1 & that is the price block they closed in on Friday.

As was alluded on last week, there are now no support levels until $565.99/share, which presents a new problem for SPY.

In the table below you can see that the $570-574.99/share zone is Buyer dominated 5.33:1, but there are no support levels in that zone, leading SPY into a Seller dominated zone where the ratio is 1.53:1.

Should that support level break down the next is $561.54, which occurs in a Buyer dominated zone where the ratio is 0.8:0*, indicating that sellers have not historically been active in this price zone.

Typically these zones get retested & there will be more declining volume, which suddenly leaves SPY with the $560.59/share support level & then the 200 day moving average, which represents the long-term trend.

While the decline from Friday’s closing price to hit the 200 DMA is -4.81%, it is something to keep an eye out for as we descend into an anticipated earnings season.

Unless there is a major change in advancing volume levels it seems unlikely that there will be any sturdy upside move in the coming week, and should there be one the 10 & 50 DMAs’ resistance will also need to be broken through, which seems unlikely after the past few weeks.

At best, perhaps price will straddle/oscillate around the 10 DMA.

SPY has support at the $565.99 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.53:1), $561.54 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*), $560.59 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*) & $552.58/share (200-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.25:1) price levels, with resistance at the $580.91 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1), $581.90 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2.1:1) & $590.12/share (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.2:1) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF finished the week down -2.2%, as the tech-heavy NASDAQ index saw even more selling than SPY.

Their RSI is also downtrending & sits at 42.89, while their MACD continues to bearishly decline.

Volumes were -2.28% lower than the previous year’s average level (36,027,500 vs. 36,869,643), which is cause for concern similar to SPY’s, given that this occurred on a short week.

Again, while average volume levels of the past year have become diluted compared to what they were when running the same exercise nine months ago, these “high” levels are cause for concern given that they’re occurring on declining weeks at somewhat pivotal points on their one year charts.

Much like SPY, QQQ opened the week up on unstable footing, with a spinning top candle on Monday that had long upper & lower shadows indicating that there was a lot of tug of war taking place between bulls & the bears.

Tuesday the floor fell out from under QQQ, as the day opened higher, but on the week’s second highest volume their price crashed through the 10 day moving average’s support & their candles’s lower shadow showed that there was appetite for taking on the 50 DMA as well.

Wednesday confirmed this, when the day wound up temporarily breaking down through the 50 DMA, but was able to close as a doji that closed lower than it has opened, indicating weakness, especially when combined with the low volume.

Friday the session opened on a gap down to below the 50 DMA & never tested its resistance level, and continued to decline lower, with a lower shadow indicating that there is likely more downside movement on the horizon in the coming week(s).

As we’ve been saying for months, QQQ & SPY have been trading quite similarly to one another & what to look for this week is similar between the two.

On each ETF’s chart there is an emerging bearish head & shoulders pattern, which appears to be continuing into this new week.

QQQ’s 10 DMA will cross bearishly through their 50 DMA as well by Wednesday, which will apply downwards pressure on the price, leading to their 200 DMA, the long-term trend, which is currently their fourth support level from Friday’s closing price.

Their 200 DMA is -6.2% below Friday’s closing price, which will make for an interesting test against the long-term trend should they meet again like they did temporarily in August (recall they barely came out of that ahead).

Prices are likely to fluctuate around between the 200, 50 & 10 DMAs in the coming week in a form of consolidation.

Referencing the data below re: volume sentiments appears like a rosy picture at first, but aside from the $492-495.99/share zone there is not a whole lot of support, particularly when you break down how untested many of the price levels below are.

Any type of upside movement will likely be straddling/oscillating around the 10 DMA, as unless there is significant advancing volume there doesn’t appears to be much left in the tank to retest QQQ’s all-time high.

QQQ has support at the $502 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 3.22:1), $493.69 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.13:1), $484.08 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.88:1) & $475.74/share (200-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.52:1) price levels, with resistance at the $508.47 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.6:1), $512.41 (50-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1) & $517/share (10-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.33:1) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF declined -3.39%, as the small cap index was the least favored of the major four index ETFs last week.

Their RSI is trending down towards the oversold 30 mark & sits at 33.33, while their MACD continues its descent lower.

Volumes were -6.52% lower than the previous year’s average (29,140,000 vs. 31,172,738), which is sending a bearish signal given that 20% of the trading week didn’t take place & the week resulted in declines; people wanted out.

Monday opened up similar to QQQ & SPY, where low volumes & wide daily ranges ran supreme, but IWM’s session managed to close lower than it opened, a bearish signal.

Tuesday the bleeding really started, as the day opened within the prior day’s range made an upwards move but was quickly halted only to break down below the 10 day moving average’s support, and barely being able to rally up to close in-line with it on the second highest volume of the week.

Wednesday this theme continued, as the session opened on a gap down & while it managed to close higher than it opened, and the low volumes made it near impossible for IWM to run at the 10 day moving average’s resistance.

Friday this continued, with another gap down which brought IWM’s price +1.46% above the 200 day moving average, making the long-term trend beginning to look in danger.

Friday’s volume being the highest of the week is also a troubling issue, as it does begin to make the long-term trend look in danger of breaking down.

As mentioned above, there also appears to be a bearish head & shoulders emerging which will require some heavy advancing volume to break out of to the upside.

It should be noted too that the 4th support level for IWM is also their 200 DMA, much like SPY & QQQ.

This week it will be important to keep an eye out on how the price interacts with the 200 DMA’s support & the descending 10 & 50 DMAs above them.

So far in 2024 IWM managed to stay above the 200 DMA’s support, but this is looking like that may break down in the event of a retest, particularly as their all-time high took place only a month ago.

Volume sentiment also suggests that the trend may break down, given that the $212-215.99/share price level is Seller dominated 1.29:1.

Should that break down the $208-211.99/share zone is the strongest Buyer zone nearby for IWM, which will need to hold up should the $209.94/share support level be tested again.

IWM has support at the $216.73 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.66:1), $214.01 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1), $213.96 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1) & $213.71/share (200-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.29:1) price levels, with resistance at the $217.85 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.66:1), $221.04 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1), $222.11 (10-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) & $223.51/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF dropped -1.83% last week, as even the blue chip index saw investors creeping towards the door & taking profits.

Their RSI is also trending down towards the oversold level much like IWM & sits at 33.24, while their MACD continues to sink lower.

Volumes were -18.58% lower than the previous year’s average (2,737,500 vs. 3,362,341), which signals that market participants are really getting anxious & there’s a bit of fear in the air.

Monday began on a high volume sell-off (relative to the rest of the week) where the 10 DMA’s support broke down.

Tuesday managed to open above the 10 DMA, but quickly ducked bath beneath it & that theme carried out throughout the week based on the downside appetite shown by the candle’s lower shadow.

Wednesday the bleeding took a short pause on low volume, and the spinning top candle showed that there was quite a bit of uncertainty in the air, especially as the session did not advance much at all towards the 10 DMA’s resistance.

Friday the pain continued, on a gap down session that wound up taking -1.6% off of DIA’s price on high volume for the week.

In the week ahead it will be beneficial to keep an eye out on for how the price moves in relation to the resistance of the 10 & 50 DMAs above, as well as how far above its 200 DMA’s support it can stay before a retest.

DIA is further from its long-term trend line vs. the previous three mentioned index ETFs in terms of support levels, but its price is still ~3% above the 200 DMA’s support, while a similar head & shoulders reversal pattern to the prior three ETFs is appearing on their one year chart.

Sustainable upward movement for DIA will require an influx in advancing volume, and the volume at the immediate price levels below Friday’s close do look like they’re ready to be tested against, particularly the $408-411.99/share zone which is currently in favor of the Buyers 10:1.

DIA has support at the $414.99 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1), $413.73 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1), $410.53 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 10:1) & $408.89/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 10:1) price levels, with resistance at the $421.72 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.17:1), $426.34 (10-Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $428.40 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5:1) & $431.69/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5:1) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday the week begins with the Monthly U.S. Federal Budget at 2 pm & KB Homes reports earnings after the session’s close.

NFIB Optimism Index data is released Tuesday at 6 am, followed by Producer Price Index, Core PPI, PPI Year-over-Year & Core PPI Year-over-Year data at 8:30 am, Fed President Schmid speaking at 10 am & the Fed Beige Book at 2pm.

Tuesday morning features earnings from Progressive, followed by Applied Digital Corp. & Calavo Growers after the closing bell.

Wednesday begins with Consumer Price Index, CPI Year-over-Year, Core CPI, Core CPI Year-over-Year, Empire State Manufacturing Survey & Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Survey data at 8:30 am, followed by Home Builder Confidence Index & Business Inventories data at 10 am.

JP Morgan Chase, BlackRock, BNY Mellon, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs & Wells Fargo report earnings before Wednesday’s opening bell, with Concentrix, H.B. Fuller, Home Bancshares & Synovus reporting after the session’s close.

Initial Jobless Claims, U.S. Retail Sales, Retail Sales minus Autos, Import Price Index & Import Price Index minus Fuel data are all scheduled for 8:30 am on Thursday.

Thursday morning starts off with UnitedHealth Group, Bank of America, First Horizon, Insteel Industries, M&T Bank, Morgan Stanley, PNC Financial Services Group, & U.S. Bancorp reporting earnings, followed by Bank OZK & J.B. Hunt Transportation Services after the closing bell.

Friday the week winds down with Housing Starts & Building Permits data at 8:30 am, followed by Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization data at 9:15 am.

SLB reports earnings Friday morning, as well as Citizens Financial Group, Fastenal, Huntington Banc, Regions Financial, State Street, Truist Financial & Webster Financial.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF PUBLISHING THIS ARTICLE ***

SPY, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF dipped -0.51% on a short holiday week last week, while the VIX closed the week at 16.13, indicating an implied one day move of +/-1.02% & a one month implied move of +/-4.66%.

Their RSI is trending up back towards the neutral 50 mark & sits currently at 48.33 after Friday’s bullish session, while their MACD remains bearish.

Volumes were -11.6% below the prior year’s average (50.430.000 vs. 57,050,198), which should be cause for concern given how low they’ve been in the previous months when prices were advancing & this week was short & a declining week.

This becomes even more concerning when you factor in that Friday’s session was +1.25% & was the only advancing session of the week.

Monday started the week off on a sour note, as an opening gap down led to a high wave candle on high declining volume for the week.

While the session managed to temporarily break out above the 50 day moving average’s resistance, it was unable to close near it & resulted in a doji candle, setting the stage for a week of further declines.

Tuesday managed to open higher than Monday’s close, but again market participants were in a selling mood & the day resulted in a bearish engulfing candle pattern that was unable to break above the 50 DMA’s resistance.

Wednesday the market was closed for New Years day, but the selling continued on Friday, as the third highest volume session of the week brought on further declines.

Thursday’s session also tried to test the 50 DMA unsuccessfully, and the lower shadow on the candlestick indicates that there is still downside appetite from where the week closed up.

Friday was the only advancing session of the week & the only reason that the weekly losses were pared to the level that they were, as prices closed just above the 10 & 50 day moving averages.

Monday will be important to watch to see if SPY dips back below their 10 & 50 DMAs, which will be crossing over bearishly either on Monday or Tuesday.

Based on last week’s outflows it seems unlikely that they will remain above these levels, particularly given how Friday’s advancing session had the week’s lowest volume.

It’s also worth noting that volumes were much stronger than they’ve been since April 19,2024, which is not a good thing given that the week resulted in a decline & should’ve been worse had Friday not staged the recovery that it did.

Another thing to note is that the window created by the post-election gap up still has not been completely filled, which adds another bit of negativity to the mix when thinking about where SPY is headed next.

The beginning of this week will focus on whether or not the 10 & 50 DMAs can hold up as support levels, as SPY is barely above them from a price perspective, but they have a history of being Buyer dominated 4.2:1 over the past ~2 years.

In the event of a breakdown, the next three support levels fall in a zone that has been dominated by the Sellers 2:1 over that time period, which indicates that there is selling pressure all the way down to $579.99/share.

Should this breakdown occur there’s no support until $565.99, which is in a Seller dominated zone 1.53:1, before entering a relatively untested Buyer dominated zone in the $560-564.99/share range.

That would be a -5.4% decline from Friday’s closing price, which in a shortened four day week in observance of President Carter’s death is likely a stretch.

There isn’t much data or earnings this week that would inspire much of an upwards move, unless the December FOMC minutes come in with a massively dovish tone & the recent volumes do not indicate that market participants will be overly eager to jump back into the pool.

SPY has support at the $591.85 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.2:1), $591.38 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 4.2:1), $584.15 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2:1) & $581.90/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 2:1) price levels, with resistance at the $598.16 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.5:1), $602.48 (Volume Sentiment: Even, 1:1) & $607.03/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.8:0*) price levels.

QQQ, the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF declined -0.76%, faring the worst of the major index ETFs for a second consecutive week.

Their RSI just broke north through the neutral level & sits at 50.94 after Friday’s session, while their MACD remains bearish.

Volumes were -12.73% lower than the previous year’s average (32,287,500 vs. 36,996,008), which like SPY’s is troubling considering how much lower than average they’d been for the prior 8-9 months while QQQ was advancing.

QQQ opened the week up on a similar foot as SPY, gapping down & resulting in a high wave candle that closed in line with its open, indicating that there was quite a bit of uncertainty among market participants.

Volumes were solid Monday & that participation rolled into Tuesday, when QQQ opened higher, but slid lower throughout the day to close out for a loss just above the 50 day moving average’s support.

Thursday continued the trend of weakness, as the day opened midway through Tuesday’s range, before declining & temporarily breaking down through the 50 DMA’s support, but managed to close in-line with it.

Friday the bulls came out to play, although in low numbers as the volume wasn’t spectacular in the wake of the declines of the prior six sessions, and QQQ ended the week just below its 10 day moving average’s resistance.

This coming week will focus on whether or not QQQ can find enough buyers to come out & continue to push prices higher.

Friday’s price action showed that market participants want to respect by the medium-term trend given that Thursday managed to close above the 50 DMA & Friday went higher, but the volumes around it were not convincing.

Even if the 10 DMA is broken above temporarily, QQQ’s current price level & the one above it & one below it are all historically dominated by Sellers, so there will need to be a big push in order to break back above these zones.

To the upside, QQQ is still ~3% from their All-Time High, which was aided greatly by Friday’s +1.64% advancing session to offset some of the other declines of the prior six days.

With this in mind & recalling that this too is a short week those & the relationship of price to the 10 & 50 day moving averages will be in focus.

QQQ has support at the $514.75 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $510.53 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.38:1), $508.47 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.6:1) & $502/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 3.22:1) price levels, with resistance at the $519.18 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 1.33:1), $531.24 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 0.6:0*) & $538.28/share (All-Time High, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 0.7:0*) price levels.

IWM, the iShares Russell 2000 ETF advanced +0.92% for the week, as the small cap index staged a bit of a recovery in its consolidation range after a rocky end to 2024.

Their RSI is trending up towards the neutral mark & sits currently at 44.5, while their MACD is still bearish, but its histogram is signaling that there may be a further consolidation in the near-term.

Volumes were -15.72% below the previous year’s average level (26,452,500 vs. 31,387,826), which is not a major indicator of strength & confidence, despite the brief recovery from the losses of the previous month.

Like SPY & QQQ, IWM opened on a gap down on Monday & the session closed as a high wave candle on decent volume for the week, further distancing itself from the resistance of the 10 & 50 day moving averages.

The next day gapped up on the open & tested higher to briefly break through the 10 DMA’s resistance, but was unable to stay elevated & would up dropping lower to test against the $220/share price level, before closing above it but below the opening price, indicating that there was still lots of negative sentiment in the air.

Thursday managed to open above the 10 DMA & move higher, but gave back all of the gains by the end of the session & closed lower than it opened with a lower shadow that indicated that there was appetite for IWM below $220, which will be something to keep an eye on in the coming week(s).

Thursday’s moves came on the highest volume of the week as well, which helped gather investor momentum for Friday’s +1.49% advance which brought the week into the black.

It should be noted that Friday’s session was the lowest volume session of the week, which makes the staying power of the move higher come into question.

IWM faces a difficult week(s) ahead, as they have a number of resistance levels just overhead, all of which belong to a price zone that s historically Seller dominated 3:1.

It should be noted that the last time prices broke above the $227.18/share resistance level was the gap up after the U.S. Presidential election, so pending another catalyst that inspires optimism among market participants, it is difficult to see much strength to the upside without a large increase in volume.

IWM has managed to consolidate since the end of December & stayed in a relatively tight range near the 10 day moving average, which is likely to continue into this week.

Another thing to keep an eye on is that in the event of a decline, the long-term trend (200 day moving average) is just -4.93% below Friday’s closing price & is currently in a seller dominated price zone ($212-215.99), which will make for an interesting retest after IWM managed to stay above their 200 DMA in August, the last time they met.

IWM has support at the $223.51 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1), $222.19 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1), $221.04 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.92:1) & $217.85/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.66:1) price levels, with resistance at the $225.20 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $225.73 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $226.50 (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) & $227.18/share (Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1) price levels.

DIA, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF slipped -0.66% for the week, as even the blue chip index was not immune to losses.

Their RSI is trending back towards neutral & currently at 41.95 after Friday’s session, while their MACD is still trending bearishly.

Volumes were -6.4% lower than the prior year’s average (3,182,500 vs. 3,400,040), which indicates that even the blue chip names have begun to lose their luster in the eyes of market participants.

Monday began the week with the second strongest volume of the week & resulted in a gap down high wave candle, indicating that there was a wide range of prices that the market deemed fair for DIA, both above & below it.

Tuesday opened on a gap higher but proceeded to go lower throughout the day & resulted in a decline on the week’s second lowest volume, leading to Thursday which is where things become interesting.

Thursday opened on a gap higher above the 10 DMA’s resistance, tested a little bit higher, before galling back down through the 10 DMA, testing lower than any day of the week & settled for a loss & forming a bearish engulfing pattern with Tuesday’s candle on the week’s highest volume.

Friday saw an advance of +0.79% which helped trim the losses of the rest of the week, but it came with an interesting twist as the candle formed a bullish harami pattern with Thursday’s candle.

What makes this interesting is that the session had the lowest volume of the week, indicating a lack of conviction among market participants, and it also resulted in a spinning top candle, which shows indecision.

Moving into this week it will be interesting to see if DIA is able to break above the 10 DMA’s resistance, and if it can if it remains there or if it is a short term stay.

The window caused by the election has still not been fully filled, which should be on people’s radar as there is only one support level separating Friday’s closing price and the bottom of the window.

It should be noted that the support of the 200 Dya moving average is -4.9% below Friday’s closing price, so if the window does close there may well be a test of the long-term trend.

While the price zone above the 200 DMA has historically been Buyer dominated 10:1 ($408-411.99), this may not be able to save DIA from a downside test of it.

To the upside, should DIA break above its 10 DMA, it still has the resistance of the 50 DMA & would likely find itself consolidating into a range between the two for the rest of the coming short week.

DIA has support at the $421.72 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.17:1), $414.99 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1), $413.73 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 1.67:1) & $410.53/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 10:1) price levels, with resistance at the $427.87 (10 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Sellers, 3:1), $431.69 (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 5:1), $433.60 (50 Day Moving Average, Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.67:1) & $433.67/share (Volume Sentiment: Buyers, 2.67:1) price levels.

The Week Ahead

Monday kicks the week off with Fed Governor Cook speaking at 9:15 am, followed by Factory Orders at 10 am.

Commercial Metals reports earnings before Monday’s opening bell.

Fed President Barkin speaks Tuesday at 8 am, followed by Governor Waller speaking & U.S. Trade Deficit data coming out at 8:30 am & ISM Services data & Job Openings data at 10 am.

Tuesday morning’s earnings reports include Apogee Enterprises, Lindsay Corp. & RPM Inc., followed by AAR Corp., AZZ, Cal-Maine Foods & Simulations Plus after the closing bell.

Wednesday leads off with ADP Employment data at 8:15 am, Minutes from December’s FOMC meeting at 2pm & Consumer Credit data at 3pm.

Acuity Brands, Albertsons, AngioDynamics, Helen Of Troy, MSC Industrial, Radius Recycling & UniFirst report earnings before Wednesday’s opening bell, followed by Greenbrier, Jefferies & Penguin Solutions.

Initial Jobless Claims data is released Thursday at 8:30 am, followed by Fed President Harker speaking at 9 am, Wholesale Inventories data at 10 am & Fed Governor Bowman speaking at 1:35 pm.

Simply Good Foods will report earnings on Thursday morning, followed by Accolade, KB Home & PriceSmart, but the market will not be open in observance of President Carter’s recent passing.

Friday the week winds down with the U.S. Employment Report, U.S. Unemployment Rate, U.S. Hourly Wages & U.S. Hourly Wages Year-over-Year data at 8:30 am before Consumer Sentiment (prelim) data at 10 am.

Delta Airlines, Walgreens Boots Alliance, Constellation Brands, Neogen, TD Synnex & Tilray all report earnings before Friday’s opening bell, with WD-40 reporting after the session’s close.

See you back here next week!

*** I DO NOT OWN SHARES OR OPTIONS CONTRACT POSITIONS IN SPY, QQQ, IWM OR DIA AT THE TIME OF WRITING THIS ARTICLE ***