Free Weekly Stock Market Commentary 8/7/2026
By Lawrence G. McMillan
A little more than a week ago, the FOMC meeting concluded (on July 29th), and traders were not happy. They sold the market before and after the meeting, closing $SPX that day at 7316. But then a series of events both real and psychological took place that released a buying panic.
The net effect of this was that $SPX has broken out to new all- time highs, and has not fallen back below the old highs at 7620. That makes the $SPX chart bullish again, for the first time in a while. Targets are always nebulous things, but this could take $SPX to 8,000 or so.
Equity-only put-call ratios have not rolled over to buy signals. As much as $SPX has risen, it has been accompanied by continued buying of puts on stocks. That is for protection most likely. So, even though these put-call ratios have curled over a little bit in the last few days, the computer analysis programs are not rating them as being on buy signals.
Breadth hasn't been that great, given the extent of the $SPX rally. However, it did expand when the new highs were made, on August 3rd and 4th. Even so, the NYSE-based breadth oscillator remains on a sell signal, and the "stocks only" oscillator is barely clinging to a new buy signal. Until these two are in agreement, we won't act on a new signal here.
$VIX tried to move above its 200-day Moving Average when the market was selling off in mid-to-late July. The green circle on the chart in Figure 4 shows multiple days where $VIX traded above the 200-day MA. However, it only closed above 19 once. So, the trend of $VIX buy signal for stocks remains intact.
So, the $SPX chart has turned positive, and that is our most important indicator. The fact that some of the internal indicators are having trouble following along is a bit disconcerting, but is not a deal breaker. In any case, we will take any new confirmed signals that arise, and we will continue to roll deeply in-the-money options.
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