At the 4:00 PM ET cash close on Friday, the S&P 500 stood at 7,743.41, up 39.28 points or 0.51 percent. December E-mini futures settled at 7,803.75, up 36.75 points or 0.47 percent. Three lower settles ended there. The bar made a higher high and a higher low against Thursday and settled at 83.4 percent of a 66.25 point range. After the close, between 04:19 PM and 04:22 PM ET, Iran's foreign minister described a seven-day plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. The cash market had already shut.
Lower crude carried the session. Provider commentary attributed the gains to a slide of more than 2 percent in crude on hopes for a diplomatic path through the Strait, to strength in chipmakers and artificial-intelligence names and to firmer data. The ten-year yield still closed 2 basis points higher at 5.18 percent, so equities rose against rising rates. On Saturday the President rejected the plan, and with it the deal hopes behind Friday's crude relief. The tariff agreement with China is a partial offset.
Monday asks whether a contract that sits above every settlement average and closed near its high can clear the 7,760 cash resistance, 7,820.34 in futures at the measured basis, once crude and yields have priced the weekend. The dealer-positioning model keeps the cash index 33.41 points above its modeled volatility threshold at 7,710, where it describes hedging as dampening movement. The primary setup is a long from 7,774 to 7,784. It carries lower conviction after Saturday, and delayed public quotes at 07:39 PM ET Sunday showed the contract at 7,781.50, inside that band.
Prepared for the Monday, September 28, 2026 session. December S&P 500 futures settled at 7,803.75, up 0.47 percent, after a 7,814.75 to 7,748.50 session with a higher high and a higher low against Thursday; the cash index closed at 7,743.41, 33.41 points above the 7,710 modeled volatility threshold. The first overhead references are Friday’s 7,814.75 high, the 7,820.34 futures equivalent of the 7,760 cash resistance and the 7,822.31 oscillator stall, then Pivot R1 at 7,829.50 and the 7,835.27 deviation line. Support starts at the 7,793.80 to 7,789.00 group around the Pivot Point, then 7,772.23 to 7,770.34. The primary setup is a long from 7,774 to 7,784, stop 7,746, targets 7,812, 7,845 and 7,878, void in real time on a ten-year yield above 5.23 percent. Monday carries Federal Reserve speakers and no tier-one data.
Friday's short from 7,780, graded against the bar
Our S&P 500 futures outlook for Friday was built with the ten-year at 5.16 percent, and it leaned short. The card sold 7,780 to 7,794, the band around the futures equivalent of the modeled volatility threshold, the 5-day average and Thursday's high, with a 7,819 stop and objectives at 7,755, 7,723 and 7,691. It named a settle above Pivot R1 at 7,797.92, with the cash index back above 7,715, as the line that negates the thesis. The Friday ES outlook carries the full level map.
Friday opened at 7,759.00 and ran from 7,748.50 to 7,814.75. The band traded in full. The high stopped 4.25 points beneath the stop. The low went 6.50 points through the first objective and held 25.50 above the second. The daily bar cannot show which of those came first, so this outlook asserts no fill and no sequence.
The close settled the question. ES finished at 7,803.75, 5.83 points above 7,797.92, and the cash index closed at 7,743.41, 28.41 above 7,715, so both halves of the invalidation printed at the close. The override named a durable goods miss or a dovish Federal Reserve voice pulling the ten-year toward 5.10 percent. Neither came. Headline durable goods orders were unchanged against a consensus decline of 0.3 percent, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed, and the yield added 2 basis points. The short lean was wrong on the day, and that goes on the record.
Two of our three range cases were drawn too low. The low-range case, 7,735 to 7,790, held the low, and the high overran its top by 24.75 points with the settle 13.75 above it. The most likely band, 7,715 to 7,800, also held the low; the high cleared it by 14.75 and the settle by 3.75. Only the high-range case, 7,690 to 7,830, contained the whole bar, with 15.25 points to spare at the top.
The path call missed with them. It weighted a settle beneath the 7,777.87 to 7,783.50 zone above a settle through it, and ES settled 20.25 points above 7,783.50. The alternative it named as the invalidating case, a settle above Pivot R1 at 7,797.92, is the one that printed. The same outlook had flagged the heavy short in the Leveraged Funds category as a squeeze risk on good news. In our reading Friday supplied that news through crude, though no flow measured it.
A higher high, a higher low and a 7,803.75 settle
Friday was a recovery bar. The completed session opened at 7,759.00, 8.00 points beneath Thursday's settle, and the settle finished 44.75 points above the open, 55.25 above the low and 11.00 beneath the high. The high sat 31.25 points above Thursday's 7,783.50 and the low 41.25 above Thursday's 7,707.25. The 66.25 point range was 0.84 times the published 14-day average daily range of 78.57. No intraday series was captured, so the order of the extremes is not asserted and no path is drawn.
The extremes are back-solved from the published pivot ladder. The third resistance point at 7,895.75 minus the third support point at 7,697.00, divided by three, returns 66.25, and the second pair, 7,855.25 and 7,722.75, divided by two, returns the same. Three times the 7,789.00 Pivot Point less the settle gives a 15,563.25 high-plus-low sum, and 7,814.75 with 7,748.50 reproduces all seven rungs. The overview page and the chart's daily bar show the same open, high and low. The chart's last 30-minute bar closed at 7,805.75, a post-settlement print that is not used as the settle.
The week gave back and then recovered. Settles read 7,833.50 on Monday, 7,831.75 on Tuesday, 7,772.50 on Wednesday, 7,767.00 on Thursday and 7,803.75 on Friday. Friday recovered 36.75 of the 66.50 points lost from Monday's settle to Thursday's, 55.3 percent, and printed the highest settle since Tuesday. Daily ranges ran 133.50 on Monday, 38.00 on Tuesday, 84.50 on Wednesday, 76.25 on Thursday and 66.25 on Friday. The week spanned 7,848.50 to 7,707.25. Tuesday's high held, with Friday 33.75 points short of it.
The prior week sits entirely underneath. September 14 through 18 spanned 7,739.25 to 7,575.00, and Friday's 7,748.50 low sat 9.25 points above that week's high. No prior-quarter high or low was captured, so the 13-week extremes stand in: the 7,905.00 high, set on 08/13/26 and also the 52-week high, and the 7,386.00 low, set on 07/29/26. The settle sits 101.25 points beneath the high. The one-month high of 7,850.75, set on 08/28/26, sits 47.00 above it.
The retracement grid published for Monday sits beneath the market. The 38.2 percent retracement from the four-week high is 7,745.41, the 50 percent retracement of the four-week range 7,712.88 and the 38.2 percent retracement from the 13-week high 7,706.74. No four-hour series was captured, so no four-hour swing is described.
Every average sits beneath the settle, in order. Computed from 260 completed sessions of the December contract, the 5-day stands at 7,801.70, the 9-day at 7,745.25, the 20-day at 7,743.48, the 50-day at 7,720.65, the 100-day at 7,657.39 and the 200-day at 7,342.59. The settle sits 2.05 points above the 5-day, 58.50 above the 9-day, 60.28 above the 20-day, 83.11 above the 50-day, 146.37 above the 100-day and 461.16 above the 200-day. The December contract was a deferred month until the September roll, so the 100-day and 200-day rest partly on thinly traded settlements. The 5-day rose 18.25 points from 7,783.45. The 20-day slipped 0.30 from 7,743.78, so the medium horizon is flat.
Monday's crossing prices all sit beneath the market: 7,771.38 for the 40-day, 7,756.41 for the 9-day and 7,741.37 for the 18-day. Relative strength reads 57.65 on the 9-day, 55.40 on the 14-day, 54.54 on the 20-day, 54.56 on the 50-day and 54.68 on the 100-day, and the 14-day grid places its 50 percent line at 7,745.65 and its 70 percent line at 8,065.61. The 14-day reading is moderate.
Stochastics run hot. The 9-day and 14-day raw readings each stand at 83.64 percent, with %K at 75.35 percent and %D at 80.38 percent; the 20-day reads 82.96 percent and the 50-day 80.49 percent. The published grid places the 14-3 day raw stochastic 80 percent threshold at 7,793.80, 9.95 points beneath the settle, and the 70 percent threshold at 7,766.45.
Direction has not confirmed the recovery. On the 9-day the directional index reads 18.65 with positive direction at 22.07 under negative at 25.41; on the 14-day, 13.70 with 21.04 under 24.48; on the 20-day, 10.44 with 20.49 under 23.61. The index readings are low, so neither side is trending hard. The composite multi-indicator read is 56 percent buy for a second session, strength soft and direction weakening, and the composite indicator itself reads hold. A week ago it read 16 percent buy and a month ago 24 percent. The short-horizon group averages 40 percent buy, the medium 75 percent and the long 67 percent.
Volatility is modest. The 14-day average true range stands at 76.66 points, 0.98 percent of price, and the 14-day average daily range at 78.57; the 9-day pair reads 77.26 and 83.22 and the 20-day 77.30 and 76.82. Historic volatility reads 11.31 percent on the 9-day, 10.89 percent on the 14-day and 10.46 percent on the 20-day. One average true range either side of the settle frames 7,727.09 to 7,880.41. The published deviation bands are tighter: 7,772.23 to 7,835.27 at one deviation, 7,759.17 to 7,848.33 at two and 7,749.15 to 7,858.35 at three. The desk note's implied one-day move of 0.68 percent, applied to the cash close, is 52.66 cash points; its own implied-move pair of 7,769.93 and 7,664.97 is centred on neither the close nor the reference and is recorded, not used.
Then the reopen. Delayed public futures quotes read at 07:39 PM ET Sunday put ES at 7,781.50, inside the 7,774 to 7,784 band, after a reopen low of 7,778.75. November crude read 93.65 at the same time, beneath its 94.75 Friday session high, so the crude condition that would have voided the long before entry had not been crossed. The stop and the invalidation were intact at that read. No later Sunday series was captured for ES.
A 5.18 percent ten-year, a 7,710 threshold and a 375,574 contract short
Friday's data leaned firm. The durable goods report at 08:30 AM ET showed headline orders unchanged against a consensus decline of 0.3 percent and core orders up 0.3 percent against a 0.6 percent consensus, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. Provider commentary put August nondefense capital goods orders excluding aircraft up 1.6 percent against 0.6 percent expected. The final University of Michigan sentiment reading printed 48.1 against a 47.5 consensus, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed.
Rates did not cooperate. The ten-year yield index closed at 5.18 percent, up 2 basis points, after a 5.16 to 5.23 percent session, and the thirty-year closed at 5.50 percent. The dollar index closed at 100.97, down 0.32 percent. The Cleveland Federal Reserve president said between 02:47 PM and 02:58 PM ET, per the news feed, that a good economic outlook is pressuring yields up, that artificial-intelligence investment demand is competing for investors in the bond market and that the United States is on an unsustainable fiscal path. Provider commentary described the New York Federal Reserve president's remarks on returning inflation to target as hawkish. The desk note described ten-year and thirty-year yields at two-decade highs this week, by its account.
Equity options priced the week's calendar. The desk note put at-the-money implied volatility at 10.1 percent for Wednesday's expiry and 11.4 percent for Friday's, which it translated into expected moves of 63 and 71 basis points, and noted a forward implied volatility of 14.9 percent against a term structure of 11.3 percent. The volatility index closed at 14.87, down 0.80 points. The volatility-of-volatility index closed at 87.84, down 3 percent, and the note described fixed-strike volatility declining across the board.
The timing of the Iran news matters for how Friday's rally is read. The plan came after the settle and the cash close, while futures still traded until the 5:00 PM ET end of electronic trading, and no later price series was captured, so the session's gain did not follow that announcement. On Saturday the President told reporters the plan was not acceptable. Per press reports, it had asked the United States to release frozen funds, lift oil sanctions and end the naval blockade of Iranian ports within four to five days, with the Strait reopening by day seven. Iran's foreign minister replied that Iran would not back down on its conditions.
Sunday brought security headlines, none of them independently confirmed. Iranian media reported missiles and drones fired at vessels near Qeshm Island in the Strait, with no verified damage count. The Revolutionary Guards said they had seized a United States underwater drone, and Saudi Arabia said it intercepted Houthi drones aimed at the Riyadh area and a ballistic missile aimed at Khamis Mushait. On trade, the United States and China agreed after President Xi's visit to cut tariffs on 30 billion dollars of non-sensitive goods in each direction and to extend the truce by two months, from November 10 to about mid-January 2027, alongside a new artificial-intelligence dialogue, per press reports. For the index that is the partial offset.
Leadership came from the old economy. Provider commentary put the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 0.93 percent, the S&P 500 cash index up 0.51 percent and the Nasdaq-100 cash index up 0.42 percent, so industrials led and technology trailed. No sector breadth series was captured, so no advance-decline figure is asserted. No megacap reported. A leading chip designer's 1 billion dollar commitment to a European compute provider crossed at 09:01 AM ET and a bank's price-objective increase on a major processor maker at 09:37 AM ET. The desk note recorded a megacap platform company falling about 3 percent near its 750 level with single-stock hedging delta of minus 462 million dollars, the largest negative reading in 30 days by its account.
The dealer-positioning desk note, published at 5:12 PM ET Friday, is the primary flow surface for this contract. Its model reads a modeled volatility threshold at 7,710, a primary gamma concentration at 8,000, a call-side ceiling at 7,800, a put-side base at 7,500 and a modeled gamma-flip level at 7,659. Its own summary lists resistance at 7,760 and 7,800, a pivot at 7,690 and support at 7,700 and 7,675. The cash close sits 33.41 points above the threshold, 84.41 above the gamma-flip level, 16.59 beneath the 7,760 resistance and 56.59 beneath the call-side ceiling. Above the threshold the model describes dealer hedging as dampening movement. That is the model's interpretation, not a measured cause.
The reference column needed checking, and it held. That column is the prior session's close: Thursday's 7,704.13 matches the cash reference of 7,704, and Friday's 7,743.41 is a 0.51 percent gain from it. The note's December futures column reads 7,767.2 for the reference, 7,773.2 for the threshold, 8,063.2 for the concentration, 7,863.2 for the ceiling, 7,563.2 for the base and 7,722.2 for the gamma-flip level. Each is the cash value plus exactly 63.2, a fixed offset. This outlook uses the 60.34 point basis measured on Friday, 7,803.75 less 7,743.41, instead.
The dealer gauges read firm but not stretched. The gamma index reads 2.055, gamma tilt 1.165 and gamma notional 493.101 million dollars, and the 25-delta risk reversal sits at minus 0.036. Call volume was 761,632 contracts against put volume of 902,647, and call open interest 9.233 million against put open interest 13.044 million. An equity console row updated Friday showed call gamma of 4.2 billion dollars, put gamma of minus 1.3 billion dollars and next-expiry gamma at 10.95 percent of the total.
Flow stayed short-dated. The note recorded index hedging delta of minus 11 billion dollars on the day, about 90 percent of it in same-day expiries, for a third session of that pattern, and read it as momentum-driven. It described a same-day iron condor of about 7,000 lots at 7,670/7,665 and 7,775/7,780 that was adjusted during the session, with the customer short put at 7,670 raised from 7,000 to 9,000 lots. It flagged the quarter-end rebalance and an options collar roll as catalysts for the week. Those are the note's characterisations; no timestamp-aligned flow series was captured.
The mapped confluence levels give the finest grid for Monday. Around the close sit 7,735 at a conviction score of 86.27, 7,743 at 96.69 and 7,750 at 98.21. Above: 7,758 at 93.73, 7,773 at 98.05, 7,781 at 97.90, 7,797 at 99.63 and 7,827 at 97.82. Beneath: 7,727 at 93.90, 7,689 at 90.02, 7,673 at 92.75 and 7,650 at 98.45. These are cash values and scores, not calibrated frequencies.
Leveraged funds are heavily short. The positioning report as of September 22, 2026 shows them long 120,133 contracts, down 41,043, against short 495,707, up 41,388, a net short of 375,574 that widened by 82,431 on the week. Asset managers held 1,118,655 long against 184,200 short, a net long of 934,455, and dealers held 168,132 long against 802,335 short. The news feed separately reported equity-fund speculators raising their net short in the S&P 500 contract by 66,665 to 355,121, a different aggregation. A short that size keeps a squeeze available on good news; that is interpretation, not a measured flow. Open interest stood at 1,898,072 on the 09/24 row, against 1,894,151 on 09/23.
The trade map for Monday September 28
For ES, Friday’s 7,814.75 high is the first overhead reference, 11.00 points above the 7,803.75 settle. The futures equivalent of the 7,760 cash resistance at 7,820.34, at the measured basis of 60.34 points, and the 14-day oscillator stall at 7,822.31 follow, with Pivot R1 at 7,829.50 and one standard deviation resistance at 7,835.27 the next pair. Tuesday’s 7,848.50 high, two standard deviations resistance at 7,848.33 and the 7,850.75 one-month high sit within 2.42 points of one another, with Pivot R2 at 7,855.25 and three deviations resistance at 7,858.35 just above. The 7,800 cash call-side ceiling translates to 7,860.34. The 7,881.21 crossover stall, Pivot R3 at 7,895.75 and the 7,905.00 annual high are the extended references.
Beneath the settle, the 7,793.80 stochastic 80 percent threshold, the 7,790.00 published target price and the 7,789.00 Pivot Point form the first group. One standard deviation support at 7,772.23, the 40-day crossing at 7,771.38 and the 7,770.34 futures equivalent of the modeled volatility threshold sit within 1.89 points, with the 7,766.45 stochastic 70 percent threshold and Pivot S1 at 7,763.25 beneath them. The lower band runs from the 7,760.34 equivalent of the 7,700 cash support through two deviations support at 7,759.17, the 9-day crossing at 7,756.41, the 7,750.34 equivalent of the 7,690 cash pivot and three deviations support at 7,749.15 to Friday’s 7,748.50 low. Pivot S2 at 7,722.75, the 7,719.34 gamma-flip equivalent and Thursday’s 7,707.25 low are the deeper references, and Pivot S3 at 7,697.00 is the extended support.
The Monday plan is a long from 7,774 to 7,784, above one standard deviation support. Friday made a higher high and a higher low against Thursday, settled at 83.4 percent of its range, sits above every settlement average in stacked order and keeps the cash index above its modeled volatility threshold. A heavily net-short Leveraged Funds book leaves room for a squeeze. The soft and weakening composite and the negative 9-day directional reading argue the other way, so the setup is an analyst judgment. It also carries lower conviction after Saturday. Its macro override names a rejection that sends crude sharply higher, and the first half of that condition is now met.
Sunday's reopen had already reached the band by 07:39 PM ET, at 7,781.50 after a 7,778.75 low. Through the Globex night the bias is mildly constructive above the 7,789.00 pivot, with an expected band of roughly 7,775 to 7,825. The Bank of Japan minutes and Japanese services producer prices are listed for 07:50 PM ET Sunday, forecast 3.6 percent against 3.6 percent, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed.
London carries a Bank of England policymaker at 06:00 AM ET, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed, with the dollar and European yields as the cross-reads. Bias neutral to constructive, expected band roughly 7,770 to 7,830.
New York has no scheduled tier-one release on the captured calendars. Vice Chair for Supervision Bowman speaks at 08:15 AM ET, as reported by the Federal Reserve Board schedule and unconfirmed against the verified forward calendar, and the President of the European Central Bank at 10:00 AM ET, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. The 09:30 AM ET cash open sets the first test against the 7,760 cash resistance. A hold above 7,789.00 keeps the 7,829.50 to 7,835.27 pair in reach. Acceptance beneath 7,770.34 would return the cash index beneath its modeled volatility threshold. Expected band roughly 7,760 to 7,840.
The afternoon brings a European Central Bank board member at 12:10 PM ET and the Richmond Federal Reserve president at 01:30 PM ET, both per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed, with Governor Cook at 01:25 PM ET as reported by the Federal Reserve Board schedule and unconfirmed. The quarter-end rebalance that the desk note flagged for Wednesday can shape flows through the week. Expected afternoon band roughly 7,770 to 7,835. No structural expiry falls on Monday; the provider lists the December contract’s expiration as 12/18/26.
The week's anchors follow. The Reserve Bank of Australia decides at 12:30 AM ET Tuesday, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed, and job openings print at 10:00 AM ET Tuesday. Personal income and outlays arrive at 08:30 AM ET on September 30, 2026, quarter end, and a large memory-chip maker reports after that day's close with its conference call at 04:30 PM ET. The employment report lands at 08:30 AM ET on October 2, 2026, all per the verified forward calendar. Press-report previews, unconfirmed, put the payrolls consensus near 100,000 with unemployment seen at 4.2 percent from 4.1 percent.
Three cases frame Monday: 7,780 to 7,830 on the low-range case, 7,760 to 7,845 on the mid-range case, which is the most likely, and 7,727 to 7,880 on the high-range case. In our analyst judgment the reopened session holds above the 7,789.00 pivot through Asia and Europe, with crude and the ten-year yield the main inputs. After the cash open the contract tests the 7,820.34 equivalent of the 7,760 cash resistance. A settle between the pivot and the 7,848.33 to 7,850.75 pair is weighted above a settle outside it, because the cash index sits above the modeled volatility threshold and the directional readings have not confirmed the recovery. A settle beneath Friday’s 7,748.50 low would invalidate the reading and put the 7,719.34 gamma-flip equivalent in play.
The 7,760 cash line sits 16.59 points above Friday's close, and the weekend's crude and yield response decides how hard Monday leans on it.
The complete data picture
Every number behind Monday’s plan, charted first, then the full level lists, then the complete numeric reference underneath.
Full numeric reference, the remaining figures from the session review
Carried below in the review’s own words: the weekend update, the session review, structure, averages, oscillators and volatility from section 2, the macro drivers from section 4, the cash index options section 5 and the Monday calendar from section 7.
Weekend update
On Saturday morning, September 26, President Trump told reporters as he left the White House that the seven-day plan Iran's foreign minister described after Friday's settle was not acceptable, saying Iran wanted a deal because it was losing badly. Per press reports, the plan asked the United States to release frozen funds, lift oil sanctions and end the naval blockade of Iranian ports within four to five days, with the Strait of Hormuz reopening and final talks starting by day seven; Iran's foreign minister replied that Iran would not back down on its conditions and was waiting for the mediators. On Sunday, September 27, after the rejection, Iranian media reported multiple missiles and drones fired at vessels near Qeshm Island in the Strait, per press reports, a report that remains unconfirmed with no verified damage count, and Iranian armed forces spokesmen warned the United States against further intervention in the Strait. The Revolutionary Guards also said on Sunday that they had seized a United States underwater drone in the Strait. Saudi Arabia said it intercepted Houthi drones aimed at the Riyadh area and a ballistic missile aimed at Khamis Mushait. Iran's president used the United Nations General Assembly to say Tehran remains open to diplomacy.
On trade, the United States and China agreed after President Xi's visit to cut tariffs on 30 billion dollars of non-sensitive goods in each direction and to extend the trade truce by two months, from November 10 to about mid-January 2027, alongside a new artificial-intelligence dialogue, per press reports.
Week ahead, from the verified forward calendar: JOLTS at 10:00 AM ET Tuesday; the PCE price index with personal income and outlays, and the third estimate of second-quarter GDP, at 08:30 AM ET Wednesday; the weekly petroleum status report at 10:30 AM ET Wednesday; a large memory-chip maker's results after Wednesday's close, with its conference call at 04:30 PM ET per the company's announcement; an athletic-apparel maker's results after Thursday's close; and the September employment situation at 08:30 AM ET Friday. Press-report previews, unconfirmed, put the payrolls consensus near 100,000 with unemployment seen at 4.2 percent from 4.1 percent. Also per press-report previews and unconfirmed against the verified calendar: Conference Board consumer confidence and the Reserve Bank of Australia decision on Tuesday, ADP employment, Chicago PMI and the China official PMIs on Wednesday, ISM manufacturing and weekly jobless claims on Thursday, with Wednesday also the quarter end. On Monday, Vice Chair for Supervision Bowman at 08:15 AM ET, on bank supervision and regulation, and Governor Cook at 01:25 PM ET, on artificial intelligence and emerging technology, are listed as reported by the Federal Reserve Board schedule, unconfirmed against the verified forward calendar. Governor Barr's economic outlook remarks are listed for Tuesday at 12:40 PM ET, as reported by the Federal Reserve Board schedule and unconfirmed against the verified forward calendar.
What changes for ES. Friday's gain came with lower crude on hopes of a United States and Iran deal, per press reports. Iran's foreign minister described the plan only after Friday's settle and the 4:00 PM ET cash close, between 04:19 PM and 04:22 PM ET per the news feed, while futures still traded until the 5:00 PM ET end of electronic trading, and no later price series was captured, so the session's gain did not follow that announcement. Saturday's rejection removes the deal hopes behind that crude relief; the tariff agreement is a partial offset for the index. The long setup in section 8 is unchanged in its levels but carries lower conviction: its macro override named a rejection that sends crude sharply higher, and the first half of that condition is now met. A crude reopen above Friday's session high would void the long before entry, and a ten-year yield move above its own Friday session high still voids it in real time. Those session highs were 94.75 in November crude and 5.23 percent in the ten-year yield.
2.1 Intraday and session review
The completed Friday session opened at 7,759.00, 8.00 points beneath Thursday's settle, marked a high of 7,814.75 and a low of 7,748.50, and settled at 7,803.75. No intraday series was captured this run, so the order in which those extremes were reached is not asserted and no path claim appears anywhere in this review. What the daily bar establishes is geometry: the settle finished 44.75 points above the open, 55.25 points above the low and 11.00 points beneath the high, which places it at 83.4 percent of the 66.25 point range.
The session extremes used here are the completed-session inputs behind the published pivot ladder rather than an independently read bar, back-solved from the outer pivot pairs and verified against every rung. The third resistance point at 7,895.75 minus the third support point at 7,697.00, divided by three, returns 66.25, and the second resistance point at 7,855.25 minus the second support point at 7,722.75, divided by two, returns the same 66.25. Three times the Pivot Point of 7,789.00 less the 7,803.75 settle gives a high plus low sum of 15,563.25, and the resulting pair of 7,814.75 and 7,748.50 reproduces all seven published rungs. Because Globex does not reopen on a Friday evening, the provider's overview page dated for the Friday session and the chart's daily bar both show the same completed-session open, high and low. The chart's last 30-minute bar closed at 7,805.75, a post-settlement electronic print that is not used as the settle.
2.2 Daily structure
Friday's bar sits above Thursday's on both ends, and its high stayed 33.75 points beneath Tuesday's 7,848.50 high. The week of September 21 through September 25 spanned 7,848.50 at the high on Tuesday and 7,707.25 at the low on Thursday, and settled at 7,803.75. The prior week, September 14 through September 18, spanned 7,739.25 to 7,575.00, and Friday's low at 7,748.50 sits 9.25 points above that week's high.
For the quarterly reference the review uses the 13-week extremes as the available proxy, because no prior-quarter high or low was captured this run. The 13-week and 52-week high stands at 7,905.00, set on 08/13/26, and the 13-week low at 7,386.00, set on 07/29/26. The settle sits 101.25 points beneath the 13-week high, and the one-month high of 7,850.75, set on 08/28/26, sits 47.00 points above it.
2.3 Swing structure
The daily settlement sequence for the week reads 7,833.50 on Monday, 7,831.75 on Tuesday, 7,772.50 on Wednesday, 7,767.00 on Thursday and 7,803.75 on Friday. Friday recovered 36.75 of the 66.50 points lost from Monday's settle to Thursday's, or 55.3 percent, and its settle is the highest since Tuesday's 7,831.75. Daily ranges ran 133.50 on Monday, 38.00 on Tuesday, 84.50 on Wednesday, 76.25 on Thursday and 66.25 on Friday.
The retracement grid published for Monday places the 38.2 percent retracement from the four-week high at 7,745.41 and the 50 percent retracement of the four-week range at 7,712.88, both beneath the market, and the 38.2 percent retracement from the 13-week high at 7,706.74. No four-hour series was captured this run, so the four-hour swing sequence is not described.
2.4 Moving averages
The averages cited in this subsection were computed this run from the provider's daily settlement series for the December contract, preserved in the coverage receipt, which holds 260 completed sessions. The 5-day average stands at 7,801.70, the 9-day at 7,745.25, the 20-day at 7,743.48, the 50-day at 7,720.65, the 100-day at 7,657.39 and the 200-day at 7,342.59. The provider's published 5, 20, 50, 100 and 200 day figures reproduce from the same rows. The December contract was a deferred month until the September contract's roll, so the older rows behind the 100-day and 200-day averages are thinly traded deferred-contract settlements, and those two averages carry that caveat.
The 7,803.75 settle sits 2.05 points above the 5-day average, 58.50 above the 9-day, 60.28 above the 20-day, 83.11 above the 50-day, 146.37 above the 100-day and 461.16 above the 200-day, and the averages are stacked in order from the 5-day down to the 200-day. The 5-day average rose 18.25 points from Thursday's 7,783.45, while the 20-day slipped 0.30 points from 7,743.78, so the medium-horizon average is flat.
The projection grid gives the prices at which each average would be crossed on Monday: 7,771.38 for the 40-day, 7,756.41 for the 9-day and 7,741.37 for the 18-day, all beneath the market.
2.5 Oscillator and trend readings
The oscillator figures below are as published on the provider's technical page for the Friday session. Relative strength reads 57.65 on the 9-day, 55.40 on the 14-day, 54.54 on the 20-day, 54.56 on the 50-day and 54.68 on the 100-day. The published 14-day relative-strength grid places the 50 percent line at 7,745.65 and the 70 percent line at 8,065.61, so the 14-day reading is moderate.
Stochastics are high. The 9-day and 14-day raw stochastic each read 83.64 percent, with %K at 75.35 percent and %D at 80.38 percent; the 20-day raw stochastic reads 82.96 percent and the 50-day 80.49 percent. The published grid places the 14-3 day raw stochastic 80 percent threshold at 7,793.80, 9.95 points beneath the settle, and the 70 percent threshold at 7,766.45.
The directional system has not confirmed the price recovery. On the 9-day the directional index reads 18.65 with positive direction at 22.07 and negative direction at 25.41; on the 14-day it reads 13.70 with positive direction at 21.04 under negative at 24.48, and on the 20-day 10.44 with positive direction at 20.49 under negative at 23.61. The directional index readings are low, so neither side is trending strongly. Historic volatility reads 11.31 percent on the 9-day, 10.89 percent on the 14-day and 10.46 percent on the 20-day.
The composite multi-indicator read published for Friday is 56 percent buy, with the signal strength described as soft and the short-term direction as weakening, and the composite indicator itself reads hold. The snapshot history reads 56 percent buy for the prior session, 16 percent buy a week ago and 24 percent buy a month ago. The short-horizon group averages 40 percent buy, the medium-horizon group 75 percent buy and the long-horizon group 67 percent buy.
2.6 Volatility and expected range
The published 14-day average true range stands at 76.66 points, 0.98 percent of price, and the 14-day average daily range at 78.57 points; the 9-day figures are 77.26 and 83.22, and the 20-day figures 77.30 and 76.82. Friday's realised 66.25 point range was 0.84 times the 14-day average daily range.
A one-range projection from the 7,803.75 settle using the 14-day average true range of 76.66 points frames Monday between 7,727.09 and 7,880.41. The published standard-deviation bands are tighter: one deviation spans 7,772.23 to 7,835.27, two spans 7,759.17 to 7,848.33 and three spans 7,749.15 to 7,858.35. The desk note's implied one-day move of 0.68 percent, applied to the 7,743.41 cash close, is 52.66 cash points; the desk note's own implied-move pair of 7,769.93 and 7,664.97 is centred on neither the close nor the reference and is recorded rather than used.
4.1 Dollar, rates and Fed policy
The ten-year yield index closed at 5.18 percent, up 2 basis points. Its Friday session range ran from 5.16 to 5.23 percent, and the thirty-year closed at 5.50 percent. The dollar index closed at 100.97, down 0.32 percent. The durable goods report released at 08:30 AM ET showed headline orders unchanged against a consensus decline of 0.3 percent and core orders up 0.3 percent against a 0.6 percent consensus, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed; provider commentary put August nondefense capital goods orders excluding aircraft up 1.6 percent against 0.6 percent expected. The final University of Michigan sentiment reading printed 48.1 against a 47.5 consensus, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed.
The Cleveland Federal Reserve president said between 02:47 PM and 02:58 PM ET, per the news feed, that a good economic outlook is pressuring yields up, that artificial-intelligence investment demand is competing for investors in the bond market and that the United States is on an unsustainable fiscal path, and provider commentary described remarks by the New York Federal Reserve president on returning inflation to target as hawkish. The desk note described ten-year and thirty-year yields at two-decade highs this week, by the desk note's account.
4.2 Large-cap leadership and earnings
The captured calendars carried no megacap earnings report for Friday. Provider commentary credited chipmakers and artificial-intelligence names with supporting the market, and the news feed carried a leading chip designer's 1 billion dollar commitment to a European compute provider at 09:01 AM ET and a bank's price-objective increase on a major processor maker at 09:37 AM ET. The desk note recorded a megacap platform company falling about 3 percent near its 750 level with single-stock hedging delta of minus 462 million dollars, the largest negative reading in 30 days by the desk note's account. The next scheduled large-cap report on the verified forward calendar is the memory-chip maker's results after the close on September 30, 2026, with its conference call at 04:30 PM ET.
4.3 Geopolitical backdrop
The Iran story moved toward de-escalation. Provider commentary tied the crude slide to hopes for diplomacy to end the United States and Iran conflict and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and the news feed carried a press report at 11:55 AM ET that the talks had entered a technical stage. After the 4:00 PM ET cash close, between 04:19 PM and 04:22 PM ET and while futures were still trading ahead of the 5:00 PM ET end of electronic trading, Iran's foreign minister said Iran had conveyed a concrete seven-day plan to the United States that would end with the Strait open, starting when the United States accepts it. The weekend leaves the proposal unanswered with no market open.
4.4 Sector breadth and rotation
Provider commentary put the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 0.93 percent, the S&P 500 cash index up 0.51 percent and the Nasdaq-100 cash index up 0.42 percent, so the industrial average led and technology trailed on the day. No sector-level breadth series was captured this run, so no advance-decline figure is asserted.
4.5 Cross-asset and volatility
The volatility index closed at 14.87, down 0.80 points, and the desk note recorded the volatility-of-volatility index at 87.84, down 3 percent, and described fixed-strike volatility declining across the board. The desk note put at-the-money implied volatility at 10.1 percent for Wednesday's expiry and 11.4 percent for Friday's, which it translated into 63 and 71 basis point expected moves, and noted a forward implied volatility of 14.9 percent against a term structure of 11.3 percent. Crude settled at 92.41, down 2.33 percent, and gold at 4,321.2, up 0.54 percent. The measured basis tonight is 7,803.75 less 7,743.41, or 60.34 points, from the futures settlement and the cash close.
4.6 Institutional positioning
The positioning report as of September 22, 2026 shows leveraged funds long 120,133 contracts, down 41,043, against short 495,707, up 41,388, a net short of 375,574 that widened by 82,431 contracts on the week. Asset managers held 1,118,655 long against 184,200 short, a net long of 934,455, and dealers held 168,132 long against 802,335 short. The news feed separately reported equity-fund speculators increasing their net short in the S&P 500 contract by 66,665 to 355,121, a different aggregation. The widening leveraged-fund short keeps a squeeze available on good news; that is interpretation, not a measured flow. Open interest on the December contract stood at 1,898,072 on the latest published row for 09/24, against 1,894,151 on 09/23.
5. Cash index options flow
This is the primary flow surface for this instrument rather than a proxy, and every level quoted from it is a cash index value unless a futures pair is stated explicitly. The desk note used is the edition published at 5:12 PM ET on Friday, September 25.
The reference price column requires care and this run verified it explicitly. That column is the prior session's close, not Friday's: Thursday's 7,704.13 close matches the cash index reference of 7,704, the technology index reference of 30,478 matches Thursday's 30,478.86, and the broad fund's reference of 767 matches the provider's 767.18 close for Thursday. Friday's cash close of 7,743.41 is a 0.51 percent gain from that reference, which reproduces the desk note's stated close of 7,743 and its 0.5 percent gain.
The dealer-positioning stack reads a modeled volatility threshold at 7,710, a primary gamma concentration at 8,000, a call-side ceiling at 7,800 and a put-side base at 7,500, with a modeled gamma-flip level at 7,659. The gamma index reads 2.055, gamma tilt 1.165 and gamma notional 493.101 million dollars. The 25-delta risk reversal sits at minus 0.036. Call volume was 761,632 contracts against put volume of 902,647, and call open interest 9.233 million against put open interest 13.044 million. The mapped key cash levels are 8,000, 7,700, 7,000 and 7,800, and the desk note's own summary lists resistance at 7,760 and 7,800, a pivot at 7,690 and support at 7,700 and 7,675. The cash close sits 33.41 points above the modeled volatility threshold, 84.41 points above the modeled gamma-flip level, 16.59 points beneath the 7,760 resistance and 56.59 points beneath the call-side ceiling. Above the threshold the model describes dealer hedging as dampening movement; that is the model's interpretation of the configuration rather than a measured cause.
The futures column requires the same care as on prior sessions. The table's December futures column reads a reference of 7,767.2, a modeled volatility threshold of 7,773.2, a primary gamma concentration of 8,063.2, a call-side ceiling of 7,863.2, a put-side base of 7,563.2 and a modeled gamma-flip level of 7,722.2. Every one of those is the corresponding cash value plus exactly 63.2, so the column is a fixed-offset translation rather than an independent futures quote. The basis measured this session is 60.34, and where a level in section 3 is quoted as a futures-and-cash pair from this source it carries the source's 63.2 offset and is labelled as such.
The desk note described a 0DTE iron condor of about 7,000 lots at 7,670/7,665 and 7,775/7,780 that was adjusted during the session, with the customer short put at 7,670 increased from 7,000 to 9,000 lots, and recorded index hedging delta of minus 11 billion dollars on the day, about 90 percent in same-day expiries, for a third session of that pattern, which it read as momentum-driven rather than a longer-term positioning shift. The desk note also flagged the quarter-end rebalance and an options collar roll as catalysts for the week. These are the desk note's characterisations; no timestamp-aligned flow series was captured this run.
The mapped confluence levels with their conviction scores give the finest-grained map available for Monday. Around the close: 7,735 at 86.27, 7,743 at 96.69 and 7,750 at 98.21. Above: 7,758 at 93.73, 7,773 at 98.05, 7,781 at 97.90, 7,797 at 99.63 and 7,827 at 97.82. Beneath: 7,727 at 93.90, 7,689 at 90.02, 7,673 at 92.75 and 7,650 at 98.45. These are cash values and conviction scores rather than calibrated frequencies, and they are treated as such.
The equity console row for this index, updated on Friday, showed a previous close of 7,704.13, which agrees with the published cash series, a current price of 7,744.95, 1.54 points above the published cash close and unused, call gamma of 4.2 billion dollars, put gamma of minus 1.3 billion dollars and next-expiry gamma at 10.95 percent. Its 52-week low field reads zero and is unused, and its high-volatility-point and low-volatility-point fields, 8,010 and 9,075, are excluded as low-confidence per the known defect in that pair of fields.
7. Monday calendar
Two days separate Friday's settle from the Sunday 6:00 PM ET reopen. The captured news-feed calendar lists the Bank of Japan meeting minutes and Japanese services producer prices, forecast 3.6 percent against 3.6 percent, at 07:50 PM ET Sunday, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed.
The European morning carries remarks by a Bank of England policymaker at 06:00 AM ET Monday, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. The United States morning carries remarks by the President of the European Central Bank at 10:00 AM ET, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. In the afternoon a European Central Bank board member speaks at 12:10 PM ET and the Richmond Federal Reserve president speaks at 01:30 PM ET, both per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. The verified forward calendar carries no Monday release and no Monday earnings report.
The single first-order event for the contract on Monday is not a scheduled release but the crude and yield response to the weekend's Iran diplomacy, with Vice Chair for Supervision Bowman at 08:15 AM ET the first scheduled Federal Reserve voice, as reported by the Federal Reserve Board schedule and unconfirmed against the verified forward calendar, and the Richmond Federal Reserve president's remarks at 01:30 PM ET following, per the news-feed calendar and unconfirmed. No structural expiry falls on Monday; the provider lists the December contract's expiration as 12/18/26, and the desk note lists quarter end on September 30.
Sources and methodology
The contract levels, averages, oscillator readings, positioning figures and the Monday plan come from our session review of the December S&P 500 E-mini contract, ESZ26, prepared after Friday’s close for the Monday, September 28, 2026 session and updated on Sunday before the 6:00 PM ET reopen. The chart’s daily bar and the provider’s previous close agree, so chart and levels sit on the same December contract. Friday’s extremes are back-solved from the outer pivot pairs, verified against all seven published rungs and matched by the chart’s daily bar. All six settlement averages were computed from a 260-row daily settlement series; the 100-day and 200-day rest partly on thinly traded deferred-contract settlements and carry that caveat. Oscillator readings are cited as published.
The dealer-positioning figures come from the desk note published at 5:12 PM ET on Friday, September 25, whose reference column is Thursday’s close. Cash-derived futures levels use the measured basis of 60.34 points unless labelled as the source’s own pair, which carries a fixed 63.2 point offset. The Sunday reopen prices are delayed public futures quotes read at 7:39 PM ET. Items marked unconfirmed come from the news-feed calendar or the Federal Reserve Board schedule and were not matched on the verified forward calendar; weekend headlines are press items carried on the news feed and none is independently authenticated. The look-back sets the published lines against the completed bar and asserts no fill and no order of events. Scenario ranges are analyst judgment and carry no calibration.
Not captured, and stated nowhere as a figure: any Friday intraday series, a four-hour series, a prior-quarter high or low, a sector breadth series and any Sunday futures series after the 7:39 PM ET read.
Friday’s outlook for this contract is here, and Monday’s Nasdaq-100 outlook is here. Outlooks for the equity index, technology index, gold and crude contracts are collected on the market outlook page, and our forward trading record is on the performance statement.
