Intraday snapshot · S&P 500 E-mini · Thu 17 Sep 2026
Sold from 7713.5 at the bell, bought back off 7680.5 — the morning read's wall held, and so did its floor
ES opened a tick and a half above the 08:05 read's 7712 wall and was sold to 7680.5 inside thirty minutes. Yesterday's 7680 control caught it to the half-point, and the tape has spent two hours buying its way back to 7704.75.
Who holds territory
Buyers, inside the balance
Since 10:15 every full period but two has carried positive delta and price has agreed: 7680.5 to 7706.25 on a 7,700-contract swing. That is control of the morning's range, not of the day — the 7712 wall that sold the open has not been retested.
Who is offside
Whoever sold the 10:00 low
The 9:30–10:00 sellers pressed 3,251 net into 7680.5 and got half a point under yesterday's high-side control for it. Every contract sold below 7692 is under water at 7704.75, and the < 7680 trigger they were positioned for never printed.
Opened on the wall, sold to the floor
Today's 7680.5–7716.25 range sits in the upper half of the 10–16 Sep balance (7575–7749.75, value 7626.25–7719.25) and wholly under the 36-day composite's 7712 value low. ES opened at 7713.5, above that wall, and the 9:30 bar sold it 2,246 net to 7688.25; the 7716.25 session high printed in that first period and has not been revisited. The 10:00 bar set the low at 7680.5, half a point above yesterday's 7680 control. Initial balance 7680.5–7716.25, 35.75 wide — at 11:59 it is still the whole range.
29 Jul – 16 Sep · contains the 2 beside it, not today
5 sessions
5 sessions
developing
Bars are bucketed to approximate distribution shape only. Every labelled price — POC, VAH, VAL, and the levels at right — is the exact tick-level value, not a bucket midpoint.
Today's whole range sits between yesterday's 7680 control and the composite's 7712 value low. Yesterday's 7699 high and the 7703 complex value high split that band, and price at 7704.75 is a point and a half above the latter.
Two reclaims of 7699, one failure between them
The 10:15 bar turned it: +2,819 net, the largest period of the day, lifting price from 7692.25 to 7703.75 and through yesterday's 7699 high for the first time. The 10:30 bar held 7696.25–7703.25 on −298, then 10:45 gave the reclaim back — 7699.5 to 7688.25 on +678, price falling on buying. The 11:00 bar's 7683.75 low was the second test of the 7684 area and held above the 7680.5 IB low; from there 11:00, 11:15 and 11:30 ran +1,881, +1,021 and +1,631, and price answered each, closing 7692, 7696.25 and 7703.5. The 11:30 high of 7706.25 is the best print since the open, three points over the 7703 complex value high and ten under the IB high. Neither IB edge has been extended.
A 7,700-contract swing, and price went with it
Cumulative delta ran −2,246, −2,550, −3,251 through the first three bars while price lost 33 points from the open — sellers in control, price agreeing. The 10:15 bar's +2,819 erased most of it in fifteen minutes, and 10:45 is the tell: +678 net while price fell eleven points, offers absorbing the first attempt to hold above 7699. Absorption that holds becomes a high; it did not, and from 11:00 the cumulative went 1,829, 2,850, 4,481 with price making higher lows at 7683.75, 7689.75, 7695.25. From the 10:00 trough the delta has swung 7,700 and price has travelled 24 points with it. So far in the 11:45 period the delta is −405 under a 7705.5 high.
Nothing triggered; the wall and the floor both held
The primary's > 7712 was the open, not a trade: price was above it for the 9:30 bar only and sold. The alternate's 7699 probe was met at the open, but its < 7680 trigger missed by half a point at 10:00, and the 11:30 reclaim of 7699 is the opposite of what it needs. The bear's < 7649 is 56 points away and untouched. Of the levels the read called key, 7712 has held as a wall, 7680 as a floor, and 7699 has changed hands twice and is currently held from above.
Buyers own the range; sellers still own 7712
Buyers hold the range from the floor up and the 10:00 sellers are offside. Control ends at 7712 until it is retested, and a 35.75-point IB is a narrow claim.
What argued for the primary
- Delta swung +7,700 from the 10:00 trough; price agreed
- Higher lows 7683.75 → 7689.75 → 7695.25 since 11:00
What argued against
- 7712 sold the open and is untested since
- No IB extension either way
What decided it
Flow leads, structure lags: control until 7712 answers.
The rest of the session
Above the IB high, the opening sellers cover and the overnight high is next
PrimaryAcceptance over 7716.25 puts the 7712 wall and the 9:30 sellers offside together; the overnight high at 7722.25 is the first stop, the 11 Sep value low at 7732.75 the second.
The 7699–7712 band rejects a third time and the floor is retested
AlternateAnother failure between yesterday's high and the composite value low sends price back through 7699 to the 7680 floor; the buyers who chased 7703.5 at 11:30 pay for it.
The floor breaks and the morning's alternate arrives late
BearBelow 7680 the IB extends down for the first time and yesterday's control is lost; the 14 Sep value low at 7665 is first, the 15 Sep value low at 7649 second.
What to watch
- 7712 The wallSold the open on −2,246 and has not been retested. The primary needs a retest that holds, not a print.
- 7699 Yesterday's highReclaimed at 10:15, lost at 10:45, reclaimed at 11:30. Whichever side holds it into the afternoon holds the day.
- 7680 The floorYesterday's control, held to the half-point at 10:00. Below it the IB extends down and the bear branch is live.
What this is, and what it is not
This is a context gauge — the climate a discretionary decision gets made inside. It is not a trigger, a signal, or a trade.
Mechanical order-flow entry signals do not survive out-of-sample testing, and nothing here should be treated as one. The value of a read like this is subtractive: it tells you which levels matter, which side is already committed, and when to stand down — not when to click.
Every figure above is computed rather than estimated. The synthesis is machine-written from a fixed analytical framework and reviewed before publication — how these are made. Framework v1.5 (fb07b9e+)