3:30 p.m. New York time

Half an hour before the closing bell. The S&P 500 futures rose during the session, reaching 5418.25 and then pulling back slightly.

Map of a corretion. The movement is part of a 2nd wave upward correction that began on March 10 from 5146.75. The price today has so far risen to a peak, 5418.25.

Elliott Wave Theory maps it like this:

• The first subwave of the correction, rising wave A, is nearing completion.
• Wave A is on its 5th subwave, meaning it is taking the form of a Zigzag.
• When wave 5 is complete, wave A will also be complete, and declining wave B will begin.
• It is possible that wave A ended at today’s peak. If so, the subsequent decline is the initial subwave of falling wave B.

Here is a chart showing the upward correction and its subwaves.

[S&P 500 E-mini futures at 3:20 p.m, 3-minute bars, with volume]

9:35 a.m. New York time

What’s happening now. The S&P 500 E-mini futures rose overnight. amid a larger downtrend that began on April 9.

What does it mean? The downtrend, in Elliott Wave Theory, is a 5th wave, the final wave within two C waves, one larger than the other, all working through their journeys within a 4th-wave downward correction that began on December 16, 2024.

The 5th wave has completed its first subwave and is now in its 2nd-wave upward correction. Afterward, it will resume its decline in subwave 3, typically the most powerful wae in a trend.

The rule of Elliott Wave Theory governing 2nd waves states that wave 2 cannot move beyond the start of the preceding wave 1. The 1st wave within wave 5 began on April 9 from 5528.75, and that’s the upper limit for the present wave 2. If it moves higher than that, then it’s back the drawing board for a fresh analysis.

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

 Elliott Wave Theory wave labels. Each wave listed on the charts has two components: A wave number, and a subscript in curly brackets that place the wave’s position in the fractal strucutre in relationship to Intermediate degree. The present Intermediate degree, wave 5{0}, began its rise on February 11, 2016 from 1810.10 and is still underway.

The waves referred to above are as follows. Downtrending wave 5{-8} is underway, a subwave of wave C{-7}, also declining, which in turn is a subwave of declining wave C{-6}, with both C waves encompassed by declining wave 4{-5}, which began on December 16, 2024.

Within wave 5{-8}, the second subwave, rising wave 2{-9} is underway.

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)
• C{-7} Minuscule, 3/25/2025, 5835 (down)
• 5{-8} (no name), 3/9/2025, 5528.75 (down)

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, April 11, 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