9:28 am Eastern  - The bulls are working hard to grind price higher. They got price above some key areas in the premarket session this morning. As we discussed in yesterday's Game Plan, price can go anywhere when they're in the middle of such a large, long-term consolidation range. Yesterday, they chose to defend the lows of the range and get price all the way above the moving averages that they had given up in prior days. A lot of big swings, so we still need to be careful.

There are some more overhead resistance areas they need to get through today if the bulls want to keep pushing price up. In the big picture, 700 is still a target. But getting there - if they can do it - will not be without its challenges. The typical thing will be for battles to take place at key levels, and one or more can still hand the ball over to the bears, in which case, price can still be driven down a lot. It bears repeating: we're still in the middle of stuff and price can move a lot in either direction.

SPY 691.80 is the 75% retracement from the most recent high from last Wednesday, the 11th, and the low they made on Tuesday the 17th. That level could present some resistance to the bulls, but there are other levels above it that could provide more resistance. Therefore, 691.80 isn't a tradeable level unless you see other reasons in real time that lend more validity to it being possible resistance. There are some trendlines above that retracement area that will likely cause the bears to come out to defend.

The level at 689.43 was important last week. It kept a cap on price and the bulls couldn't get on top of it. Now that they're on top of it - in the premarket at least, with less than 10 minutes until the opening bell - that level could act as support. The bulls would like to keep their position above it.

687.30 is the close from yesterday. Look for other reasons around that level, if they get down there again, that could validate its importance as support. Getting below that level and closing candles below it, opens the door to the bear axis at 685.69. If price is moving fast, I would probably leave that level alone. But 685.69 has been an area almost all month where there have been bull/bear battles each time price interacts with it. So keep an eye on that area, and look for other reasons on larger timeframe charts in real time to help confirm its importance as resistance.

No data releases of significance scheduled for today. Trade well!

Trading by the Ticks & Trades Strategy, here is where you would have landed for the day:

We said in the Game Plan to avoid trading against 691.80, so we won't count the short trade there that worked out if you chose to take it. I decided to take a chance and go short there with a small position size. The Base Hit happened quickly. The next tradable level that was hit was 692.82, but there was a Near Miss at 1:02 pm. That behavior took the level off the table for shorting. So no trade there. But when price got above the level for the right amount of time, taking the Recycle Trade at 3:24 pm was in line with the rules of the strategy. That gave you the one official Base Hit for the day.

Per the rules, a total of 4 ES points for the day.