3:30 p.m. New York time

Half an hour before the closing bell. The S&P 500 futures bounced between the 5680s and the 5760s during the session.

Elliott Wave Theory: the bounce appears to be a 4th-wave downward correction within a rising C wave, the final subwave of a 4th-wave upward correction that began about a week ago.

On the chart the structure is wave 4{-11} within rising wave C{-10} within rising wave 4{-9}.

9:35 a.m. New York time

What’s happening now? The S&P 500 E-mini futures fell overnight, part of a decline that began on March 19 from 5770.50. The low in the decline, so far, is 5682.50.

What does it mean? In applying Elliott Wave Theory, we face the same conundrum we faced a day ago, with a different end point: Did the 4th-wave upward correction end at 5750.50 on March 19, and did the downtrending 5th-wave that we’ve been expecting begin at that point?

Yesterday morning I concluded that wave 5 had begun its decline. That conclusion was quickly disproven. As the proverb has it, “Once burned, twice shy.” For the moment I’ll have the Principal Analysis follow the 4th-wave-continues scenario. Perhaps the session will provide us with some clarity..

[S&P 500 E-mini futures at 3:30 p..m., 40-minute bars, with volume]

What is the alternative? There are some wave proportion and overlaps that require a closer look.

What does Elliott Wave Theory say? Here are the waves that underlie the morning’s analyses as they appeared on the chart.

Principal Analysis

• Falling wave 4{-9} is underway and internally is in wave C{-10}.
• Downtrending wave 5{-9} will follow the end of wave 4{-9}.

Long-term Waves

These are the waves currently in progress under my principal analysis. Each line on the list shows the wave number, with the subscript in curly brackets, the traditional degree name, the starting date, the starting price of the S&P 500 E-mini futures, and the direction of the wave.

• S&P 500 Index:
• 5{+3} Supercycle, 7/8/1932, 4.40 (up)
• 5{+2} Cycle, 12/9/1974, 60.96 (up)
• 5{+1} Primary, 3/6/2009, 666.79 (up)
• 5{0} Intermediate, 2/11/2016, 1810.10 (up)
• 3{-1} Minor, 3/23/2020, 2191.36 (up)
• 3{-2} Minute, 10/13/2022, 3491.58 (up)
• S&P 500 Futures
• 5{-3} Minuette, 4/18/2024, 4963.50 (up)
• 3{-4} Subminuette, 8/7/2024, 5182 (up)
• 4{-5} Micro, 12/16/2024, 6163.75 (down)
• C{-6} Submicro, 2/19/2025, 6166.50 (down)
• 5{-7} (no name), 3/3/2025, 6000.50 (down)
• 3{-8} (no name), 3/5/2025, 5869.40 (down)
• 4{-9} (no name), 3/11/2025, 5534 (up)

Reading the chart. Price movements — waves – – in Elliott Wave Theory analysis are labeled with numbers within trending waves and letters with corrective waves. The subscripts — numbers in curly brackets — designate the wave’s degree, which, in Elliott Wave analysis, means the relative position of a wave within the larger and smaller structures that make up the chart. R.N. Elliott, who in the 1930s developed the form of analysis that bears his name, viewed the chart as a complex structure of smaller waves nested within larger waves, which in turn are nested within still larger waves. In mathematics it’s called a fractal structure, where at every scale the pattern is similar to the others.

Learning and other resources. Elliott Wave analysis provides context, not prophecy. As the 20th century semanticist Alfred Korzybski put it in his book Science and Sanity (1933), “The map is not the territory … The only usefulness of a map depends on similarity of structure between the empirical world and the map.” And I would add, in the ever-changing markets, we can judge that similarity of structure only after the fact.

See the menu page Analytical Methods for a rundown on where to go for information on Elliott Wave analysis.

By Tim Bovee, Portland, Oregon, March 20, 2025

Disclaimer

Tim Bovee, Private Trader tracks the analysis and trades of a private trader for his own accounts. Nothing in this blog constitutes a recommendation to buy or sell stocks, options or any other financial instrument. The only purpose of this blog is to provide education and entertainment.

No trader is ever 100 percent successful in his or her trades. Trading in the stock and option markets is risky and uncertain. Each trader must make trading decisions for his or her own account, and take responsibility for the consequences.

License

All content on Tim Bovee, Private Trader by Timothy K. Bovee is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Based on a work at www.timbovee.com