Bears kept the pressure on Thursday, sending the S&P 500 index futures decidedly outside their recent range to the downside as earnings season and US-Iran tensions weighed on sentiment.
The session high of 7549.50 was put in relatively early during overnight trading, and for the most part bulls managed to defend the 7500 area through the balance of the night. That defense evaporated as the opening bell approached, with bears easily breaking that psychological support to start the regular session decidedly in the red.
Buy-the-dippers came in shortly after the open and sparked a sharp rally, but it did not last long at all. Bears were soon pressuring lower, and bulls tried to maintain support at the premarket low. After chopping around just above that area, that support was broken as well. The selloff continued to a low of 7411.75 before bulls were finally able to counter. That bounce carried back to the premarket low, where resistance returned, and the index futures went back to leaking for the remainder of the afternoon.
It was only in the final minutes, once closing imbalances were in, that buyers and shorts covering helped pare some of the day’s losses. The session concluded in the lower half of the day’s range at 7445, losing 95.25 handles.
Friday, market participants can look forward to July’s S&P flash PMI data at 9:45 AM ET, along with yet another full load of earnings reports both before the open and after the close.
Among the top components of the index, Berkshire Hathaway Inc (NYSE: BRK.B) emerged as the biggest gainer as market participants flew to safety. The holding company advanced by $1.48 or 0.30% to close at $490.85 for the day.
That performance was still better than the cash index’s decline of 1.23%.
Conversely, the biggest loser ended up being Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) after its latest earnings report Wednesday evening, which missed bottom-line estimates and showed negative free cash flow in addition to caution surrounding their robotaxi rollout. For the day, the AI/EV company declined by $54.32 or 14.52% to close at $319.69. The large-capex-spend-dragging-on-cash-flow was a theme shared by Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG, GOOGL), which released its earnings report Wednesday evening and added to the drag on the index too.
