Heading into the final 45 minutes of trading, the SPX remains perched at the top of its intraday range, just beneath a key near-term resistance plateau between 1271.50 and 1273.50. Although the SPX could pause or stall here, and pullback into the 1263/61 area, the underlying pattern still argues for additional strength that hurdles 1271.50-1273.50, which should trigger a secondary thrust towards the 1290-92 target zone.

Mike Paulenoff is a 26-year veteran of the financial markets and author of MPTrader.com, a real-time diary of his technical chart analysis and trading alerts on all major markets. For more of Mike Paulenoff, sign up for a free 15-Day trial to his MPTrader Diary by clicking here.