A week packed with events and a buyer’s finish. The Fed held rates Wednesday with three votes in favor of hiking, Thursday’s GDP came in softer than expected, and Wall Street still closed the week in the green, with Amazon doing the heavy lifting on Friday. Bitcoin went its own way: the monthly options expiry cost it the $64,000 level. Here’s the data from the week that closed and the agenda for the one ahead, which builds up to the July jobs report.
What the ES, the NQ and bitcoin did
The ES (S&P 500 futures) tracked a cash index that closed Friday at 7,489.72 points (+0.7% on the session) and gained 1.05% on the week, its first green week after two in the red. July still ended nearly flat (-0.13%). The sequence matters more than the tally. On Wednesday the Fed kept the funds rate in the 3.50%-3.75% range on a 9-3 vote, with the three dissenters (Hammack, Kashkari and Logan) preferring a quarter-point hike. On Thursday, the advance Q2 GDP estimate showed 1.5% annualized growth, down from 2.1% in the first quarter. And on Friday the Employment Cost Index rose 0.9% for the quarter, a tenth above consensus. On that menu, the 10-year Treasury ended July in the 4.74% area, its highest level since January 2025, and stocks climbed anyway.
The NQ (Nasdaq 100 futures) had its redemption week. The Nasdaq Composite closed Friday at 25,373 points (+1% on the session) and advanced roughly 1.6% on the week, though July ended at -3.2%. Friday’s session was decided by two reports published the night before: Amazon jumped 15% after growing revenue 20% to $200.6 billion, with AWS accelerating to 37% growth, its fastest pace in 18 quarters. Apple, meanwhile, fell despite revenue rising 16%, because Services ($30.7 billion) and Greater China ($18.8 billion) came up short of expectations. That push carried the index straight through 25,000, the round number that had stopped it at the door the week before.
Bitcoin struck the sour note. Friday brought the settlement of the monthly options expiry: roughly 149,000 BTC contracts with $9.6 billion in notional value, a put/call ratio of 0.28 and $64,000 as the max pain strike. Once the expiry settled, price sat near $63,800, below the floor of the $64,000–$66,800 range it had held for two weeks, after touching a 24-hour high above $65,300 and giving it all back. The heavy trading area above $65,000 still weighs from above.
Next week’s agenda
An employment week, with the Fed already digested: the next meeting doesn’t arrive until September 15-16 (dates on the official FOMC calendar).
- Monday 3: Palantir reports.
- Tuesday 4: June JOLTS job openings. AMD, Pfizer and Caterpillar report.
- Wednesday 5: Disney, Shopify and Uber report.
- Thursday 6: Q2 productivity.
- Friday 7: the main course, the July jobs report at 8:30 New York time, after June’s 57,000 payrolls came in well below forecasts. July CPI doesn’t land until Wednesday the 12th (all on the BLS release schedule).
How to read this agenda with order flow
As always, the useful question isn’t where price is headed, but where volatility will show up and which levels to have marked before it does.
- Friday’s jobs report is the protocol event. With the Fed on hold and three hawks calling for a hike, the market will read the employment data as a direct rates input: a strong print feeds the hawks and a weak one reopens the opposite debate. If you plan to trade it, review the news trading with order flow guide first: smaller size, wider stops, and let the flow confirm before you enter.
- On the NQ, 25,000 switches roles. The break came on an earnings gap, not a clean auction, and that leaves the validation pending. If price returns to the level and buyers show up to defend it, the ceiling has become a floor. If it slices through without a fight, the breakout was earnings smoke and whoever bought the top is left as a trapped trader, fuel for the move in the other direction.
- On the ES, the pending resistance is still the 7,600–7,640 zone. Cash left 7,400 behind and closed at 7,489. In between sits a week of data that can bring price to either edge: the game is watching who shows up at each level, and the first hour’s range is the most objective frame for it, as covered in initial balance.
- In bitcoin, $64,000 goes from floor to test. Two weeks serving as the range base, and now price trades just below it after the expiry. Without that options flow overhead, the first visit back to $64,000 will show whether the loss was a technical adjustment or a real change of hands. How to read its 24/7 microstructure is covered in bitcoin order flow.
In short: the market heads into jobs week with recent highs in the NQ, rising yields in the bond and a crypto that just lost its floor. Mark your levels before Friday and let the data do the work of bringing price to you.