Behavior and Technical Data Support Additional Gains
Weekly Continuous
The expiring April extended its rally to $5.653 last week before fading to expire at $5.336 (similar to expiring March contract which traded to $4.944, the high of its tenure as prompt, before going off the board at $4.568). April settled higher than March for the first time since 2018. May (which closed $.006 discount to April settlement, traded lower on its first day as prompt, then reversed higher. Considered an “outside” day reversal with increasing volume left the new prompt at the highest daily continuation close since November 4th (one exception was the bizarre Feb expiration). The last trading day of March ended with another higher close and the first one above the February high. Calendar month closes above the previous month’s high are usually an indication of continuation of the intermediate term trend (bullish).
Volume and open interest increased along with price for a second week. Average daily volume was an estimated 40,000 contracts higher than last week’s +/- 47,000 increase over the prior week’s. Open interest increased a modest 4,000 contracts last week (from Thursday through Thursday). Volume and open interest moving in the same direction as price is a significant technical positive.
