S&P 500 Snapshot: Bad Friday, Down for the Week

Equity markets around the globe had a bad Friday. Asian indexes were modestly lower, but European indexes sold off sharply. The Euro STOXX 50 plunged 2.61%. In the US, the Dow closed at -0.66%, the NASDAQ at -1.29%. Our preferred benchmark S&P 500 split the difference with a -0.92% loss, which was well off its -1.21% intraday low early in the final hour of trading. Today's selloff caused the index to snap its 3-week rally with a -0.15% weekly close (although last week's close was a gain only if calculated to three decimal places).

The 10-year note closed at 1.44%, down four basis points from the previous close and a single BP off the 2016 closing low on February 11th. The yield is a whopping 61 BPs below its 2016 closing high on January 5th.

Here is a snapshot of past five sessions in the S&P 500.

Here is a weekly chart of the index, which is 1.63% below its record close in May of last year. What many of us are wondering is this: Are we seeing a top forming? And if so, what will be the size of the correction?

A Perspective on Drawdowns

Here's a snapshot of selloffs since the 2009 trough.

Here is a more conventional log-scale chart with drawdowns highlighted.

Here is a linear scale version of the same chart with the 50- and 200-day moving averages.

A Perspective on Volatility

For a sense of the correlation between the closing price and intraday volatility, the chart below overlays the S&P 500 since 2007 with the intraday price range. We've also included a 20-day moving average to help identify trends in volatility.