My hunch is that there is not much room to run to the upside without hitting the Bollinger band in a day or two. In other words, moving averages are too far from the price, so either the price must come down (correction in place) or the MAs must go up (correction in time). Because we are in a corrective move since October, a correction in price occurs more frequently, as an observation.

I was fooled by this pattern myself while still expecting a retest of EMA 9 at least before going higher. Possibly EMA21 for a buying opportunity and a swing trade to the upside.

We are looking for a pattern similar to November to the first week on December on /ES. That is, a lower low first before making a higher high on Dec 7th. The screenshot is shown below, negating a previous view with a trendline.

Incidentally, that means that the system trade short will be profitable (the view of wave 4 low in place and the short system trade in place were incompatible).

Expanding flat is to the downside in wave 4 down or A-B-C down, as shown on the picture, isn't it?

DK, consolidation is happening for now, and it may last for a week or two. 4180-4200 is proven to be a strong resistance. The move higher should occur into the OpEx this month, based on opinions of market analysts. Another option is to move higher into the end of the quarter. There was professional selling into strength on Thursday, not seen since October.

So far this move up has been corrective, not impulsive. By that token alone a move to new highs is improbable.

I am expecting a retest on EMA 9 today or tomorrow following a pattern on 11/17/2022. A low of 12320 is a likely target on /NQ.

Very shallow pullbacks throughout the day is my definition of a trend day. Volume may or may not be light on a trend day. A momentum is strong for the day.

Market is completely broken now. It goes up vertically by 3% on /NQ a Fed chairman's comment within minutes. It is a strongly trending market where reversion to the mean systems do not work. Whether or not they should try is a developer's question. A much bigger issue is that no subsystem went long in a perfectly trending upward market. It is a channel with clearly defined boundaries. It does not get any easier than that.

I am going to pull myself away from these systems till the market normalizes. I mean this as no disrespect to Matt's work. Odds are not stacked in my favor at this time.

A pullback is coming within a month at the most, when all have been fooled that everything is normal as the Fed Chairman remarked yesterday. What a travesty! And the pullback will not be shallow!

Yes, correct. The same principle is used. A trailing stop is ratcheted up or down, while a moving average is a smooth line. That is the difference.

Yes, they are called Keltner channels. The default setting is 1.5 ATR, while using 1, 2, and 3 ATRs is my preference (all three). /NG is following the 3 ATR down, by the way.

The middle line is 20EMA, which is a major EMA. I use 21EMA, which works a bit better and is a Fib number. Below 20 and 21 EMA is bearish, above 21 EMA is bullish. 

Usage is shown on the screenshot below. The middle line is depicted as a dotted line.

look up Bollinger bands based on ATR values and standard settings.

Probably another entry at the close. The market is in wave 5 melt-up. I took another SPY put at the close. If wrong, I will turn it into a bull put spread.

I looked into the last couple of years, and saw that natgas puts a bottom in February and bounces into March.

options are for small accounts or if you cannot stomach volatility on MES. A necessary evil till your account size grows up.

/NG (nat gas) is closing near the HOD today. A short-covering rally shall commence tomorrow.  Buy calls into next Friday's expiration to profit from an expected bounce.

Taking a bit of a profit on SPY puts at the close yesterday was proven to be prudent. 4010 might be the lowest assured target we could get tomorrow.

Edit: a 30-min /NQ chart is shown. A move up today has further to go to complete wave 5 up.

Today is algo dominated. Very technical on ticks today.

The chart still follows the 11/14 path, which will create a new spike high tomorrow with a close lower.

Indexes are rebounding today and should retest overnight lows either today or after the FOMC announcement. The expected move is 94 SPX points for this week. Downside targets are 3950 and 4120, and one or both could be hit. A way to play is an Iron Butterfly out of the money or a pair of a put and a call option.

I am biased towards downside into Thursday.

/GC is backtesting resistance after bouncing from support. It was very oversold on 4-hour charts this morning after having broken support last night. Moving averages are possible targets to the downside. Gold is likely remain very resilient to falling lower below 1848.

crossharry, the only buy signal I see is from today being a potentially an inside day on /NG futures. And a demand zone.