Week of Jan 4, ES/SPX futures Levels and Setups
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First off big news of 2026 starts with US military operation to capture President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. For day trading this news does not matter but this does impact longer term oil trade and hence dollar as Venezuela holds word’s largest known reserves of oil.
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Key economic events/Earnings that could influence indices:
Levels and Setups Monday Jan 5 : 🔥🔥= Critical
(These are now for March H Contract)
Long term view: As far as > 6300 tape remains in bulls’ control.
Bull bear: 6902 (Weekly bull bear level 6886)
Above: 6936, 6956/60🔥🔥, 6980, 7000 ,7036🔥🔥
Below: 6912/02🔥🔥, 6886, 6860🔥🔥, 6840, 6824🔥🔥 ,6812, 6786, 6764🔥🔥
Setups:
Long vs 6886 until converts. Flip on conversion
Short vs 6902 on conversion. 6902-12 remains Chop zone. You can short upper end if you like or wait to get long vs 12 on conversion
Short vs 6936
Do not DCA. If setup fails, flip or go on sideline until next setup materializes.
Trading Times Suggestions
Globex: 2 am to 4 am EST or After 830 Econ
RTH: 930 am thru 11 am and 2 pm to 3:30 pm . First few minutes of open can be choppy.
Setup usage suggestion
Do not try setups more than once if you have to > 3.5 handle stop loss or twice if you are take <=2 handle stop loss. Use my globex Pivot/opening setup as main directional guide and then other setups as guidance. Flip or go flat if setup reverses as I may not be in front of my screen all day, you should by now know how the process works at most you have 2/4 handle risk. Setup generally reverses on 1 minute close above/below 3/4 handles from marker. Again there is no sure shot as some time I might relax that or may go predictive. That’s general rule anyway. Also most of the time setups always gives opportunities to reenter some time even multiple times so never take trade too far away from setup markers.
Size, Stop, Scale out strategy
Remember: I never short above or long below my marker. I wait for it to pause before it or come back to it from rip/dip and pause before executing.
Avoid taking position before Econ like CPI Or FOMC. After econ watch for levels where it stops and how it interacts to decide long or short.
Size: Either 4 micro or 4 emini lots or in multiple of 4’s, risking max 1-5% of your capital.
Recommended stop: Depends on your trading style. You can start with disaster stop of -4 and
Move to -2 once you are +2 on trade
Once you hit T1 you can go to -2 and when you hit T2 you can go to BE Or
Move to BE once you are +2
Move to BE if trade is taking more than 4-5 minutes after entry
Some folks like to keep it all the way to next level though I do not like to keep my trade that loose.
Scale out: 2 lots at +6/8, 3rd at +10/16, 4th start trailing if more than 20 handles on the trade.
Solid approach on the 6902-12 chop zone framework. The discipline around not DCAing into failed setups is something alot of futures traders struggle with honestly. I like how the stop management progression ties back to the timeframe (moving to BE after 4-5mins if no follow-through). One thing that could add value: how much weight do you typically give order flow absorption at the weekly 6886 vs just teh technical level itself when deciding to flip?