Monday’s S&P 500 index futures session surrendered weekend optimism as bears dominated, with traders positioning ahead of a major earnings report from the index’s top component later this week.

Sunday night started strong, helped along by Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.B) disclosing a sizable new stake in Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG, GOOGL). Bulls drove futures to an early high of 6801.50, but stiff resistance near the psychological 6800 level and Friday’s high proved insurmountable. A steady premarket fade erased those gains by the open.

Dip-buyers provided brief morning reprieve near Friday’s close, leading to choppy two-way action for much of the session. In the final two hours, sellers broke lower, pushing the index to a session low of 6658.50, near last week and the previous week’s lows. Late short-covering and dip-buying trimmed losses in the final hour, but momentum remained bearish. The session closed below the midpoint at 6692, down 63.25 handles.

Tuesday brings a relatively light news calendar, with October’s Import Price Index possibly delayed due to the ongoing government shutdown, plus a handful of earnings before the open and after the close.

Among top index components, Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) led as the biggest gainer, jumping $8.62 or 3.11% to close at $285.60 on the Buffett buying news.

That outperformed the cash index’s 0.93% decline by a fortunate four percent.

Conversely, NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ: NVDA) was the biggest loser, falling $3.57 or 1.88% to close at $186.60.