Big losses swept the market as the Chinese trade war was blamed for today's decline, but Trump chaos has been influencing the market for a long time and the failure of the June breakouts is a more likely cause of the continued selloff. For the S&P, the next move is heading down to retest the June swing low of 2,728.  Technicals are net bearish and losses were less than hit the Russell 2000 so it has actually managed a relative gain. Before it gets there, the 200-day MA is first up.

Markets didn't react well to the Fed rate cut or the words of Jerome Powell, although today's selling didn't kill the breakouts, it did leave them under pressure. The S&P undercut its 20-day MA and only tagged breakout support of 2,953 but volume did rise in confirmed distribution. Today's action undercut the signal line in on-balance-volume and generated a sell trigger in ADX.

Sellers returned as the sequence of buy-sell-buy-sell continued. Action for the last four days continued to coil with the Russell 2000 showing this best with a series of inside days.  I would like to see this pattern break upwards and pressure 1,610s as it would maintain bullish confidence for Large Caps and Tech indices too.  The Russell 2000 still suffers from relative underperformance despite its recent improvement, but all other technicals are bullish, including a MACD trigger 'buy'.

An excellent end-of-week finish left markets well positioned heading into this week. The S&P finished with a new all-time high on light-ish volume. Gains weren't enough to reverse the MACD trigger 'sell' but other technicals are bullish.

Today's action - paired with yesterday's - has given bulls confidence more gains could be on the way. The losses were not significant and there was a great recovery breakout in the Russell 2000 'bull flag', which was feeling the pressure all through last week. Again, just as any losses were mitigated by the broader trading range, so was yesterday's gain. However, it does suggest there are buyers willing to come in if the water is nice.

Nothing spectacular from markets, but the risk of breakout failures eased with today's gains. Best of the action came from the Nasdaq as the risk of a potential 'bull trap' declined. I would like to see the MACD trigger 'sell' reverse to confirm the breakout, but I was happy not to see the 20-day MA undercut which would have just extended the prior consolidation and keep traders reluctant to get involved.

Getting back into the grove after my vacation. The month started with indices pushing new all-time highs on summer trading volume. The past week have seen some easement off those highs but there is plenty of support to work with. For the S&P there is the 20-day MA and breakout support of 2,953 just below. The recent selling did produce a MACD trigger 'sell' but other technicals are all in good shape.