Market Signal

The desk's breadth gauge flipped from mixed to short-term fragile on the September 23 close, the day the five-year Treasury yield crossed 5% and the long-bond fund closed at a record low: the equal-weight S&P is at RSI 34.6 and down 4.79% over 30 days, small caps RSI 34.4 and down 5.39%, while the cap-weighted index is up 0.57% on one sector. Two sibling gauges moved with it and both read as the same rate shock, not a rotation: the buffer-ETF saturation tell cleared (BUFR RSI 58.1, 0.42% off its high, so the melt-up condition is no longer met), and sector relative strength flipped to cyclicals-leading-defensives only because utilities (RSI 23.5, -8.03% over 30 days), REITs (RSI 26.0) and staples were sold harder than industrials and materials, which are themselves down 5-6% over the month.