Before the US market opened the economic news from China came about as expected and the Shanghai Composite rose 3.25%. European indexes followed suit, with the Euro STOXX 50 subsequently closing with a 1.54% gain. The early bias in popular financial press was that US indexes would also bounce, and that appeared to be the case for the first hour of trading. Our benchmark S&P 500 hit its 1.12% intraday high at 10:30 ET and then sold off to its -0.84% mid-afternoon low. A late rally promised to lift the index to a modest gain, but selling in the final minutes led to a trivial 1 point advance.
The yield on the 10-year note closed at 2.06%, up 3 basis points from the previous close.
Here is a snapshot of past five sessions.
Here is a daily chart of the index. Volume on today's trade remained well above its 50-day moving average.
A Perspective on Drawdowns
Here's a snapshot of selloffs since the 2009 trough.
For a longer-term perspective, here is a log-scale chart base on daily closes since the all-time high prior to the Great Recession.
Here is the same chart with the 50- and 200-day moving averages.