Situation Awareness — 2026-10-26

Situation Awareness: Cautious. Futures point modestly higher to open a pivotal week — S&P 500 futures +28 to 7,687, Dow +216 to 52,610, Nasdaq +160 to 29,278 — with relief coming from oil cooling (WTI -2.1% to $101.15) after Friday’s surge, but the tape is still nursing last week’s AI de-risking. SPY sits at $759.97, below its SMA20 ($769.87) and SMA50 ($767.48) but holding well above SMA200 ($727.36), RSI 42.1; QQQ is the weak link at $704.40, under all three moving averages with RSI 36.5 and pinned near the low of its 20-day range ($701.16-$762.86). Trade mode: selective and watchful — three central bank decisions (Fed Wednesday, BOJ, ECB) and mega-cap AI earnings (MSFT, GOOG, AMZN) make this a week to size down and let catalysts clear. Regime context — 43.4% of stocks trade above their 40-day SMA, and the 4% Bull/Bear gauge shows 167 bulls vs. 202 bears. The 5-day trend is choppy and sideways, with 20-SMA breadth snapping back to 34% from 22% — a tentative under-the-surface rebound — even as the 40-SMA reading eased 1.2pp.

SIP: THRM SYRE HTZ

What’s working: the Continuation/2LYNCH scan fired 8 signals led by CRWD (+8.3%, RVOL 1.6), LNG (+4.1%), and JBL (+2.5%); the Reversal scan showed 3 (CNH, VST, CEG); D9M is empty — breadth is thin, not rich.
Leading sectors: market closed, no live sector or theme performance; ATR volatility feed is unavailable. Use last week’s tape as proxy — energy and health care led, communication services (-6.2%) and industrials (-1.9%) lagged.
Key event: FOMC decision Wednesday with a 90.6% probability of no change — all eyes on the inflation/policy commentary, not the rate line.
Market read: Friday closed the week mixed (S&P -0.5%, Nasdaq -0.7%, Dow +0.4%, Russell 2000 +2.0%) — the broad market held up far better than the mega-cap averages. That divergence is the whole story heading into today.
DEP watchlist: no D9M signals today — nothing qualifies, stay patient.
SIPS: CRWD, LNG, JBL — the cleanest continuation candidates if the open holds.