9:35 a.m. New York time

What’s happening now? The S&P 500 E-mini futures rose early in overnight trading to 7764.50 and then began to fall. So far, the decline has reached 7687.50.

What does it mean? Elliott Wave Theory. A downtrending correction, wave 4{-4}, has been underway since October 29, 2025. The correction has taken the form of an expanding triangle, during which each rising wave moves higher than the one before and each falling wave moves lower than its predecessor.

Each subwave has three smaller waves within it. The current subwave is falling wave E{-5}, the final subwave within wave 4{-4}. Wave E{-5} is within its initial subwave, falling wave A{-6}.

One way of understanding an expanding triangle is to draw lines marking its boundaries and extend them into the future. On this chart, the upper boundary connects the October 29 start of wave 4{-4} with the end of wave B{-5}. The lower boundary connects the ends of falling waves A{-5} and C{-5}.

In theory, the subwaves of the triangle should remain within those boundaries. In practice, sometimes they don’t. The most recent rising subwave, wave D{-5}, broke through the upper boundary in late April in a dramatic fashion and continued to rise, ending well above the boundary.

So far, falling wave E{-5} remains above the upper boundary, where it began. In theory, it will eventually reach the lower boundary, which moves farther down during each minute of trading and presently is in the 6140s. Sometimes, however, waves come up short and end before reaching the boundary.

With today’s low in the 7680s so far, it is clear that wave E{-5} has quite a distance to fall if the expanding-triangle structure continues to play out. The wave is in its first subwave, falling wave A{-6}, which in turn is in its initial subwave, falling wave A{-7}.

Decision Points. The analysis remains bearish at all three presently active degrees: E{-5}, A{-6} and A{-7}. The important question at this stage is not whether the larger decline has completed, but how the smaller waves will develop as price works its way downward. Countertrend rises are to be expected along the way and, by themselves, would not invalidate the larger bearish structure.

[S&P 500 E-mini futures 9:35 a.m., 1-day 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)
• 1{-2} Minute, 7/31/2025, 6468.50 (down)
• S&P 500 E-mini futures
• 5{-3} Minuette 8/1/2025, 6239.50 (up)
• 4{-4} Subminuette 10/29/2025, 6953.75 (down)
• E{-5} Micro, 8/13/2026, 7838.50 (down)
• A{-6} Submicro, 8/13/2026, 7838.50 (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 pageAnalytical Methods for a rundown on where to go for information on Elliott Wave analysis.

By Tim Bovee, Portland, Oregon, September 8, 2026

Disclaimer

Tim Bovee, Private Trader tracks the analysis and trades of a private trader managing his own accounts. The content reflects my interpretation of market structure, including Elliott Wave Theory and related tools.

Nothing in this blog constitutes a recommendation to buy or sell stocks, options, or any other financial instrument, or to pursue any particular strategy. The purpose of this blog is education and entertainment.

No trader is ever 100 percent successful. Trading in stock and options markets involves risk and uncertainty. Each trader must make decisions for his or her own account and accept full responsibility for the outcomes.

Charts and tools are used to support my personal analysis. Any data displayed is illustrative of that analytical process and is not presented as a source of market data for redistribution.

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

License

Based on work atwww.timbovee.com