{"id":30147,"date":"2026-03-08T19:58:30","date_gmt":"2026-03-08T19:58:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/uncategorized\/30147\/"},"modified":"2026-03-08T19:58:30","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T19:58:30","slug":"the-sp-500-reversed-thursdays-rebound-retreating-cautiously-as-weak-employment-data-and-participation-disappointed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/live-updates\/30147\/","title":{"rendered":"The S&P 500 reversed Thursday\u2019s rebound, retreating cautiously as weak employment data and participation disappointed"},"content":{"rendered":"US shares failed to hold Thursday\u2019s late rebound and then fell ahead of the non-farm payrolls (NFP) release. The NFP, along with the unemployment rate and participation rate, came in weaker, with a nursing strike also affecting the data.\n\nRate cut expectations then helped shares recover, including financial stocks. Selling pressure in semiconductors eased, which helped the Nasdaq return to its pre-NFP level.\n\n

Market Breadth And Late Day Selling<\/h3>\nThe tech-to-S&P 500 ratio suggested a short-term counter-trend rise, but the last two hours brought steady selling as market breadth weakened. The US dollar did not need to rise for this move to occur.\n\nMarkets have largely priced Iran\u2019s tensions as contained and short-lived. This is reflected in oil futures backwardation, with late summer contracts priced mildly while only front-month contracts rose.\n\nGold did not surge, even as rate cut expectations increased. The view in markets remains that the conflict will end soon, despite limited evidence, with attention also turning to midterms and upcoming inflation after earlier falls in oil and petrol prices.\n\nGiven the market’s failure to hold its rebound after the disappointing jobs report, volatility is the main takeaway. We see Friday’s report of only 95,000 jobs added as a clear sign of economic slowing, even if it fuels bets on rate cuts. This uncertainty suggests buying protective puts on the SPY for the coming weeks, as the late-day sell-off showed conviction is weak.\n\nThe split between tech and the broader market is a key area to trade. The Nasdaq 100 has outperformed the S&P 500 by over 3% since the start of March 2026, driven entirely by hopes for lower rates. This divergence allows for strategies like buying call options on the QQQ while hedging with puts on more economically sensitive sectors like financials (XLF).\n\n

Iran Risk And Oil Market Hedging<\/h3>\nWe believe the market is dangerously complacent about the conflict in Iran, treating it as a short-term issue. The deep backwardation in oil futures, with Brent’s front-month contract above $95 while December contracts lag near $82, shows this mispricing of risk. This makes long-dated call options on oil ETFs like USO a compelling hedge against a prolonged conflict.\n\nRising energy prices will directly challenge the very rate cuts the market is now banking on, creating a difficult environment for the Fed. We saw a similar situation in 2022, when persistent inflation forced policymakers to become more aggressive than initially expected. Puts on Treasury bond ETFs such as TLT could perform well if upcoming inflation data surprises to the upside.\n\nThe market appears to be waiting for a clear de-escalation signal, much like the 90-day tariff pause we experienced in late 2025. The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) remains elevated above 20, showing that traders are still pricing in the potential for a sharp move. Until that catalyst arrives, using straddles on major indices could be an effective way to trade the building tension.\n\nCreate your live VT Markets account<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0start trading<\/a>\u00a0now. <\/b>\n

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Start trading now – Click here<\/a> to create your real VT Markets account <\/strong> <\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US stocks dipped after weak NFP, rebounded on rate-cut bets; Iran tensions stayed contained, limiting oil, gold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-updates"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"josephine","author_link":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/author\/josephine\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30147\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vtmarketsglobal.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}