Friday's Market Minute: Trade War Turbulence

S&P 500 futures are poised to break a three-week losing streak amid sharp price swings from a heavily news-driven trading environment. Markets made another leg up on Trade War optimism in the overnight session ahead of President Trump’s meeting with Chinese Vice Premier Liu He today. The /ES closed above its 50-day SMA yesterday, and blew past the resistance zone near the May and June tops around 2,950. This area also was confluent with the 21-day EMA, which stalled rallies all week but now seems to have been broken. A strong close above the last highs at 2,959.50 could be significant for bulls.

In other futures markets, Crude Oil spiked over 2% yesterday, despite an EIA storage build. The contract seems to have a foothold above the 52 level, but now is near resistance at 54. The British Pound rallied over 3.6% in the past two session on positive Brexit comments from the Irish Prime Minister, helping push the U.S. Dollar down 0.75% during the same time and triggering a bearish MACD cross.

Gold once again slipped below the 1,500 level after a week of range-bound trading, while Copper surged 2.1% since Thursday’s open. The red metal’s bullish move and the corresponding 3.2% upswing in Emerging Markets futures (/MME) are likely more ripple effects from Trade War sentiment. But traders should remember that these Trade War ripples could quickly turn into a tsunami for either bears or bulls if we get some kind of major news heading into the weekend.

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