Moments ago, without any specific catalyst, US equity futures just plunged when in thin, illiquid tape, a seller took out about 30 consecutive bid levels and as of last check, the ES was down as much as -48 to just 1923, or 2.5%, after being down a modest -13 minutes ago.
It is unclear just what is going on, or whether some prop desk or hedge fund just got tapped out, and/or how the Fed will react but the last time we had action like this, the Fed confused a liquidating SocGen trader for an economic collapse, and cut rates by 75 bps in January of 2008. This time it does not have that luxury.
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So while we await the Fed's response we watch in stunned amazement at a meltdown the likes of which we have not seen in years. Alternatively, if the Fed has nothing up its sleeve, the good news is that limit down for ES is just about 1870, so only 60 points more.
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Update: just when it seemed that a BTFDer had emerged, even more focused selling took ES to new lows, and as of moments ago ES was down as low as 1913, down a whopping 58 points, and officially in 10% correction territory. Also, we are now down to about 50 points from limit down.
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