The US market reopened today after its three-day Easter weekend, but the equity trade spent the session in the doldrums. Our benchmark S&P 500 logged its smallest intraday trading range of the year from its -0.20% morning low to its 0.33% mid-afternoon high. During the final two hours the index bounced off the flat-line a couple of times before its fractional 0.05% closing gain.
The yield on the 10-year note closed at 1.89%, down two basis points from the previous close.
Here is a snapshot of past five sessions in the S&P 500.
Here is a daily chart of SPY ETF, which gives a better sense of investor participation (or lack thereof) than the underlying index. A preliminary tally of trading volume looks to be the lightest of the year.
A Perspective on Drawdowns
Here’s a snapshot of selloffs since the 2009 trough.
Here is a more conventional log-scale chart with drawdowns highlighted.
Here is a linear scale version of the same chart with the 50- and 200-day moving averages.
A Perspective on Volatility
For a sense of the correlation between the closing price and intraday volatility, the chart below overlays the S&P 500 since 2007 with the intraday price range. We’ve also included a 20-day moving average to help identify trends in volatility.
