Support on S&Ps — In Sight?
Marc Dupee will be out of the
office until April 9. In his absence this column is being written by
TradersWire’s Duke Heberlein
Stock index futures had the plug pulled on the rallies
they enjoyed the past three days, with Nasdaq 100 futures
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out of a consolidation at its lows, dropping 143.50 to 1610. The S&P
futures
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from low, down 29.50 to 1160.50 at the close and look to be headed for a probe
toward the March 22 low at 1088. Dow futures
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157 points to close at 9830 heading into the Globex overnight session.
Bonds, which normally are the place to fly to when the
indices drop, failed to see substantial rotation even as the Dow, Naz and Spoos
contracts dropped from the open. T-bonds
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while 10-year notes
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at 105^22.
Euro FX futures
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European Central Bank would not be dropping interest rates on Thursday’s meeting
were driven down by traders unwinding positions to .8870, a loss of .00670. June
dollar index futures
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at 116.10. The British pound
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.005 to 1.4356. The Japanese yen
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.8258, Swiss francs
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dollar
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at .6395.
Grains continued to
exhibit weakness, keeping mostly within rangebound trade ahead of Friday’s USDA
prospective plantings and grain stocks report. Soybeans
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resumed its slide, dropping 2 3/4 to 264 1/4. Corn
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1 3/4 to 209 1/4, soybean oil
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Metals as a group all gave something back today, with
April gold
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ended at 437.5, a loss of 6.0, and copper
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down 1.85 in today’s trading to 76.85.
In the softs, cocoa
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posted .02 to the positive, ending at 8.52. May cotton
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to slide lower, down .03 to 47.56, a new 15-year low and orange juice
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The meats switched net gainers and losers from the prior
day in a choppy trading session, with feeder cattle
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.05 to 86.100 and live cattle
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April lean hogs
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bellies
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Traders in the pit have their eyes on Friday’s USDA quarterly hogs and pigs
report.
Finally, energy contracts
lacked pep, with April crude oil
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was down .0281 at .9025, and natural gas
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retreated .216 to bring the curtain down on today’s trading at 5.445.