LIVE MARKETS-Have bearish footprints caught up with the Dow Industrials?

Welcome to the home for real-time coverage of markets brought to you by Reuters reporters. You can share your thoughts with us at markets.research@thomsonreuters.com

HAVE BEARISH FOOTPRINTS CAUGHT UP WITH THE DOW INDUSTRIALS?

Amid 2025's market instability, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI has held up better than the other two main U.S. indexes.

The blue-chip average ended Friday down 8% year-to-date vs 10.2% decline for the S&P 500 index .SPX and a 15.7% slide for the Nasdaq composite .IXIC.

That said, it's been an especially rough April for the Dow. With a 6.8% month-to-date loss, it's being hit harder than both the SPX and IXIC, which are both off 5.9%.

Of note, given their deep losses, both the Nasdaq composite and the S&P 500 index have already seen death crosses, that is, their 50-day moving average (DMA) has crossed down below their 200-DMA. On Friday, the Dow finally suffered a similar fate:

Indeed, on Friday the Dow's 50-DMA ended below the 200-DMA for the first time since November 14, 2023.

Looking back over last 25 years or so, the Dow has seen 19 death crosses in the modern era. In 68% of the cases, the DJI suffered a greater decline from the point of the death cross in terms on its maximum additional intraday loss (median -6.9%, average -12.2%). In 32% of the cases, the cross occurred after the worst had already passed.

Meanwhile, Dow ended Friday at 39,142.23. Traders are watching price action vs the April 15 high at 40,791.18 and the broken support line from the October 2022 trough, which is now acting as resistance just shy of 41,000.

With e-mini Dow futures 1YMcv1 lower by more than 300 points, or around 0.8%, the DJI appears poised for more downside at Monday's open.

The 50% retracement of the Oct 2023-December 2024 is at 38,700 while the 61.8% retracement is at 37,196. The April 7 intraday low was at 36,611.78.

(Terence Gabriel)