3:30 p.m. New York time

Half an hour before the closing bell. The S&P 500 futures continued to rise during the session, reaching a higher high by a few a dollars.

I’ve moved the chart closer in to better understand the internal structure of the 5th wave that began on June 22 from 5959. For greater clarity, I’ll use the wave labels on the chart: A wave number, followed by a degree position relative to Intermediate degree.

The wave that began on June 22 is wave 5{-10}. Internally, it is in its final leg, wave 5{-11}. which began on June 22.

The closeup shows the subwaves of wave wave 5{-11}. which is presently in wave 3{-12}.

The patterns are a bit unclear within wave 5{-11}. My principal analysis is that wave 3{-12} is still underway, with the decline that preceded the current rise being a subwave with the 3rd wave.

The alternative analysis is that wave 3{-12} ended at the peak from which the brief decline began and wave 4{-12} began. Adding another choice: Wave 4 may have ended at the end of the decline, or that decline may have been wave A{-13] within wave 4{-23}.

Ambiguities abound.

9:35 a.m. New York time.

What’s happening now. The S&P 500 E-mini futures rose to a higher high overnight, 6270.75, and then fell, picking up the pace of decline after the ADP employment report showed a loss of private sector jobs, the first since 2023.

The ADP report is a preview of the government’s Employment Situation Report, which will be released on Thursday rather than the usual Friday because the markets will be closed on Friday for the 4th of July holiday.

What does it mean? Elliott Wave Theory analysis views the higher high as the end of a small downward correction and the beginning of the uptrend within a 5th wave that began June 27. The low point of the overnight decline remans above yesterday’s low, 6227.25, suggesting the uptrend has resumed.

If the price were to fall below that level, it would call this analysis into question, and I’d move to an alternative: The downward correction within wave 5 continues.

[S&P 500 E-mini futures at 3:30 p.m., 20-minute bars, with volume] 

Waves Now Underway

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)
• 5{-2} Minute, 4/7/2025, 4832 (up)
• S&P 500 Futures
• 1{-3} Minuette, 4/7/2025, 4832 (up)
• 1{-4} Subminuette, 4/7/2025, 4832 (up)
• 1{-5} Micro, 4/7/2025, 4832 (up)
• 3{-6} Submicro, 4/24/2025, 5260 (up)
• 5{-7} Minuscule, 4/25/2025, 5550 (up)
• 5{-8} (unnamed), 5/7/2025, 5596 (up)
• 5{-9} (unnamed), 5/23/2025, 5756.50 (up)
• 5{-10} (unnamed), 6/22/2025, 5959 (up)
• 5{-11} (unnamed), 6/27/2025, 6183.25 (up)
• 3{-12} (unnamed), 6/30/2025, 6224 (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, July 2, 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.