Trend Following: Week in Review - September 11, 2026

“Fourteen Markets Higher, and Both Trend Strength and Returns Reach the Top of the Sequence”

This Week in Trend – 11 September 2026

Welcome to This Week in Trend, our weekly examination of the evolving structure of global futures markets and what that structure means for systematic trend followers. This edition covers market conditions through the US close on Friday, 11 September 2026. Market returns, the SG Trend Index and the TTU Trend Barometer reading are all as at that close.

This was a week in which far fewer markets rose and the money improved anyway. Only 14 of 49 contracts finished higher, down from 24 a week ago, and 35 finished lower. Energy gained 4.02% with four of six contracts higher. Crude Oil WTI rose 9.37%, Heating Oil 9.23% and Crude Oil Brent 8.65%, the three largest advances on the board, while Natural Gas fell 4.84%. Meats gained 2.03% with Feeder Cattle up 3.86% and Live Cattle 3.16%, and the VIX rose 2.07% after seven consecutive weekly declines. Everything else fell. Grains lost 0.03%, Currencies 0.14%, Bonds 1.13% with all four maturities down, Equity Indices 1.47% with all seven contracts down, Soft Commodities 2.24%, Metals 2.62% with all five down for a third consecutive week and Bitcoin 3.40%. The average move across the board held almost exactly where it was, easing from 2.24% to 2.16%, while the spread between best and worst narrowed from 16.61 percentage points to 16.35. The same average movement arrived with ten fewer markets finishing higher.

Last week’s report asked whether the concentration it described would broaden or fade. It did neither. It deepened. Four other questions were left open. Would Energy extend a fourth week or repeat the stall of a fortnight ago? Would Bonds follow their first uniform move across the curve with another? Had Grains paused rather than reversed? And would the currency basket find something to replace the dollar factor it had lost? Energy extended, and the petroleum complex pushed further above the range that contained it through July and August, with WTI now pressing the 100 level. Bonds repeated the shape exactly and multiplied it, falling across all four maturities again with the decline still growing with maturity and the sector average close to four times larger. Grains paused again, at 0.03%, the flattest sector average on the board. The currency basket found nothing, and with the Dollar Index itself moving only 0.05% it produced six declines and two gains that owe very little to any common factor. The development none of those questions anticipated was the breadth count, which fell by ten in a week when the average move barely changed.

Trend Indicators: Barometer Rises to 59% and Enters the Favourable Band, SG Trend Index Posts the Largest Weekly Gain of the Sequence

TTU Trend Barometer: 59%, up 4 points from last week. The reading has moved above the 55% mark that separates Neutral from a favourable environment and sits inside the favourable band for the first time in the period this report has tracked. It is the highest reading of the sequence, and it follows four consecutive advances and a week unchanged. The five-week sequence now stands at 39, 50, 55, 55 and 59. The Barometer has added 29 points from the late July low of 30% and now stands 7 points above the 52% that preceded that collapse.

Here is what makes that reading worth a second look. It arrived in a week when only 14 of 49 contracts finished higher, the narrowest upside breadth in the period this report has tracked and ten fewer than a week ago. Trend strength reached the top of its range while the number of markets going up came close to halving. The SG Trend Index settled which of those two measures was describing the week, adding 2.45 percentage points, its largest weekly gain in the sequence.

There is no contradiction in that, and the reason is the one this report has returned to all month. The Barometer counts how many markets are generating medium to strong trends. It does not ask which way they are going. This week 35 of 49 contracts fell, and a great many of them fell in the direction of structures already in place. Bonds fell across all four maturities for a second consecutive week. Metals fell across all five for a third. Equity Indices fell across all seven. Orange Juice gave back its entire bounce and returned to the lows of a decline that has run most of the year, Cocoa extended its retreat from the rebound high, and Coffee fell for a third week inside the fall it has traced since spring. Sixteen contracts belong to sectors that moved entirely in one direction this week. A count of markets higher is not a count of markets trending, and it was never a count of markets paying.

The sector data explains why the reading rose. Working for it, the petroleum complex extended for a second week with WTI, Heating Oil and Brent supplying the three largest gains on the board, Bonds repeated their uniform decline across the curve at close to four times the size, Metals fell across all five contracts, Equity Indices fell across all seven, and JPY added a second consecutive gain. Working against it, Natural Gas fell 4.84% after three consecutive gains and gave back the lift off its February lows, Copper fell for the first time in the period this report has tracked after being the only Metals gainer a week ago, the VIX rose 2.07% and ended seven consecutive weekly declines, Grains produced a second week of going nowhere, and Orange Juice turned a 7.69% gain into a 6.98% loss. Five structures weakened or reversed, and the reading rose anyway. At 59%, the Barometer is describing an environment in which the trends that remain are fewer, more one sided and running harder.

SG Trend Index: +2.79% month to date for September and +14.18% year to date as of 11 September. The year-to-date figure has risen from +11.73% to +14.18%, a fifth consecutive weekly advance and a gain of 2.45 percentage points, the largest weekly improvement in the sequence this report has tracked. The month-to-date figure has moved from +0.59% to +2.79%. Set against the Barometer, the last two weeks have closed the gap that opened a fortnight ago. Three weeks ago an 11 point rise in trend strength coincided with only 0.32 percentage points of year-to-date improvement. Two weeks ago a 5 point rise coincided with 0.57. Last week the Barometer did not move at all and the index added 2.04. This week the Barometer added 4 points to reach the top of its range and the index added 2.45. Trend strength describes the persistence available. Return records the persistence a portfolio was positioned to capture, and this week both arrived at their highest readings of the sequence together.

Weekly Asset Class Snapshot

Equity Indices (-1.47% | prev -0.50%)

Equity Indices fell 1.47%, a second consecutive decline and this time a uniform one, with all seven contracts lower. The Russell 2000 lost 2.40%, the DAX 1.92%, the Nikkei 225 1.81%, the DJIA 1.59%, Euro Stoxx 50 1.19%, the S&P 500 0.80% and the Nasdaq 100 0.60%. A week ago the decline was confined to Europe while the American indices barely moved at all. This week it reached everything. The S&P 500 near 7,660.75, Nasdaq 100 near 29,391.50, DJIA near 52,576 and Russell 2000 near 2,904.70 have each stepped back from levels close to their chart highs, and all four remain well above the levels from which their advances began. The DAX near 25,587 has now fallen for a second week from the high it reached a fortnight ago and Euro Stoxx 50 near 6,326 has slipped further inside its range, while the Nikkei 225 near 64,590 has come off a high of its own. Seven contracts moving together is a change of character after a fortnight of indices going in different directions. It is also a first step back rather than a break, because not one of the seven has given up the ground that would put its advance in question.

Energy (+4.02% | prev +5.95%)

Energy gained 4.02% with four of six contracts higher, a second consecutive large sector gain and one built on a narrower base than the last. Crude Oil WTI rose 9.37%, Heating Oil 9.23% and Crude Oil Brent 8.65%, the three largest advances on the board, while Gasoline RBOB added 2.88%. Against them Natural Gas fell 4.84% and Ethanol 1.20%. A week ago all six contracts were higher. This week the petroleum complex carried the sector on its own. WTI near 99.99 and Brent near 104.32 have extended above the levels they cleared a week ago and now sit at the upper end of the ranges traced since the spring, with WTI pressing the 100 level. Heating Oil near 4.9936 and Gasoline RBOB near 3.3199 moved with them and are at the upper end of their own ranges. Natural Gas near 2.8200 gave back the whole of the three week lift off its lows, leaving the decline running since February intact again. Ethanol near 2.0550 came off the top of the slow climb it has traced since spring without disturbing it. This is the second week in which Energy has supplied most of the distance on the board, and the number of contracts doing it has fallen from six to four.

Metals (-1.37% | prev -0.72%)

Metals fell 2.62%, a third consecutive decline and the largest of the three, with all five contracts lower for the first time in the period this report has tracked. Palladium lost 5.70%, Silver 2.34%, Copper 2.01%, Platinum 1.56% and Gold 1.51%. Copper is the change worth noting. It was the sector’s only gainer a week ago and had held the firmest upward structure in the complex, and near 6.56 it has stepped back from the upper end of its chart. Gold near 4,390, Silver near 65.02 and Platinum near 1,801.60 have each extended lower, and all three remain well below the February highs they failed to recover a month ago. Palladium near 1,318 has given back the whole of the two week climb off its lows and more besides. Three consecutive sector declines, now with every contract participating, is a structure doing what a structure does. The individual moves remain modest. Their direction has not changed in three weeks.

Soft Commodities (-2.24% | prev -0.91%)

Soft Commodities fell 2.24%, the sector’s largest decline in the period this report has tracked, with two of six contracts higher. Orange Juice lost 6.98%, the largest fall on the board, followed by Cocoa at 3.67% and Coffee at 3.35%, while Cotton eased 0.31% and Sugar and Lumber each added 0.44%. Orange Juice is the instructive one. A week ago it rose 7.69% and was the third largest gain on the board, and this report described that as an interruption to a decline that has run most of the year rather than an end to it. Near 144.80 it has given back the entire gain and more, and sits back at the lows of that decline. Cocoa near 5,913 has extended its retreat from the rebound high above 6,600 and has now surrendered most of what the two week climb produced. Coffee near 284.25 fell for a third consecutive week and extends the fall it has traced since spring, the one contract in the sector that has done the same thing every week for a month. Cotton near 86.19 came off the upper end of its chart for a second week, a pullback rather than a break. Sugar near 18.15 added a second consecutive gain and is at the highest level on its chart. The sector scattered again, but this time three of the moves ran in the same direction as the structures beneath them.

Grains (-0.03% | prev -0.67%)

Grains fell 0.03%, which is about as close to nothing as a sector average gets, with three of eight contracts higher. Oats gained 2.78%, Rough Rice 0.98% and Soybean Oil 0.44%, while Corn fell 1.21%, Wheat 1.19%, Soybeans 1.01%, Canola 0.64% and Soybean Meal 0.40%. This is a second consecutive week of the complex going nowhere after the 5.63% sweep of a fortnight ago, and the levels say more than the average does. Corn near 532 is still pressing the highest level on its chart, Rough Rice near 16.07 has reached the highest level on its own, and Soybean Oil near 69.11 sits near the top of the advance it has traced since the winter. Soybeans near 1,299, Soybean Meal near 347.80 and Canola near 817.80 have each given back a little without leaving the upper end of their charts. Oats near 380.75 recovered most of what it lost a week ago. Wheat near 726.25 fell for a second week and is the only contract in the sector that has left its high behind. Two weeks of a flat average with seven of eight contracts still near their highs is not a sector losing a trend. It is a sector holding one without adding to it, which pays nothing and costs nothing.

Meats (+2.03% | prev +0.74%)

Meats gained 2.03%, a second consecutive advance and this time with size behind it, with two of three contracts higher. Feeder Cattle rose 3.86% and Live Cattle 3.16%, the fourth and fifth largest gains on the board, while Lean Hogs fell 0.94%. A week ago this report noted that the sector had produced participation without amplitude, three contracts higher with none of them moving more than 1.15%. This week the cattle pair supplied the amplitude. Live Cattle near 219.63 and Feeder Cattle near 332.56 have each lifted clearly off the lows they reached a fortnight ago, and both have now posted two consecutive weekly gains against declines that have run from the spring highs. Those declines remain the dominant feature of both charts, and neither contract has come close to the levels that would put them in question. Lean Hogs near 81.63 gave back a little and stays near its own lows. This is the second stage of what a bounce inside a downtrend looks like, and the coming weeks decide whether it is a pause with more force behind it or the beginning of something else. For a portfolio carrying short exposure in cattle, a second week of gains is a cost rather than a signal, and the size of that cost has just gone up.

Bonds (-1.13% | prev -0.30%)

Bonds fell 1.13% with all four contracts lower, a second consecutive uniform decline and close to four times the size of the first. The 30 Year Bond lost 1.78%, the 10 Year Note 1.26%, the 5 Year Note 0.98% and the 2 Year Note 0.48%. The declines again grew steadily with maturity, the same shape the curve produced a week ago, repeated and multiplied. The 30 Year Bond near 106.75, 10 Year Note near 106.17, 5 Year Note near 104.55 and 2 Year Note near 102.09 have each moved to the lowest levels on their charts, extending declines that have run across all four maturities since the winter. A week ago this report described a small but coherent move and called it the clearest example on the board of an established structure extending itself without drama. A week later the same shape arrived with four times the distance. For a portfolio carrying short exposure across the curve, this was the most productive week Bonds have delivered in the period this report has tracked.

Currencies (-0.14% | prev +0.32%)

Currencies fell 0.14% and, for a second week, moved without a common factor. JPY rose 1.58% and GBP 0.09%, while NZD fell 1.15%, CHF 0.84%, AUD 0.40%, CAD 0.20%, EUR 0.14% and the US Dollar Index 0.05%. Six lower and two higher, with the Dollar Index itself very close to unchanged. A basket that falls while the dollar does not move is not responding to the dollar, and for a second consecutive week the single factor that organised this sector through August has been absent. JPY is the one worth following. Near 0.6559 it has added 2.46% and 1.58% in consecutive weeks and has lifted clearly off the lows of the decline from above 0.6900 that has run almost without interruption all year. Two weeks does not reverse a structure months in the making, and that structure is still in place, but this is the first sustained move against it the chart has produced. AUD near 0.7158 gave back part of its climb and remains just off the upper end of its chart, the firmest structure in the basket. The Dollar Index near 98.90 stays inside the range that has contained it all year, and EUR near 1.1637, GBP near 1.3524, CAD near 0.7241, CHF near 1.2374 and NZD near 0.5826 are all still range bound. A sector without a common factor produces small averages and very little to hold.

Volatility, Crypto: The VIX rose 2.07%, ending seven consecutive weekly declines, and near 16.75 remains at the lower end of its range for the year. The conventional relationship returned this week. The VIX rose while all seven Equity Indices fell, the reverse of the pattern noted here a week ago and the first time in eight weeks the two have moved as they usually do. One week does not undo a seven week decline, and a reading near 16.75 is still a low one. Bitcoin fell 3.40% to near 77,330, a fourth consecutive week of very little distance in either direction following the 21.86% surge of a month ago. The decline from above 120,000 remains the dominant feature of its chart, and four quiet weeks have neither extended it nor challenged it.

Top Movers

The two halves of the table have separated sharply. The five largest gains range from 9.37% to 3.16%, while the five largest declines range from 6.98% to 3.40%. Composition tells the more useful story, and it is a narrow one. Three of the five gainers are petroleum contracts and the other two are the cattle pair, which means the whole of the upside came from two sectors. On the other side the declines are spread across four sectors, and four of the five extend something already in place. Orange Juice has returned to the lows of a decline that has run most of the year, Palladium has given back a two week rebound, Cocoa has retreated from a high of its own and Bitcoin continues to travel very little. Natural Gas is the exception, reversing three consecutive gains. A week ago, the balance between distance and duration was fine. This week it has tilted, and almost all of the duration is on the downside.

Portfolio View

The Barometer rose 4 points to 59%, the highest reading of the sequence and its first inside the favourable band, while the SG Trend Index rose 2.45 percentage points to +14.18% year to date, its largest weekly gain of the sequence. Two measures reached the top of their range in the same week. The third went the other way. Only 14 of 49 contracts finished higher, ten fewer than a week ago, while the average move across the board barely changed at 2.16%. Three of the four largest gains came from the petroleum complex and the next two from cattle. Everything else that paid, paid by falling. Bonds fell across all four maturities, Metals across all five, Equity Indices across all seven, Orange Juice returned to the lows of a year long decline, Cocoa came off its rebound high and Coffee fell for a third consecutive week. That is 16 contracts in three sectors moving as blocs, and it is where most of the week’s persistence lived. The portfolio did not need many markets to rise. It needed the markets it was positioned in to keep going, and in three entire sectors they did. Narrower upside breadth, greater coherence, and the best return week of the sequence. The week was strongly directional in Energy, across the Bond curve and through the Metals complex, and close to inert in Grains and Currencies.

Final Reflections

Last week the highest Barometer reading of the sequence arrived in the loudest week. This week the reading went higher still and the week was louder again. The Barometer rose from 55% to 59% while the SG Trend Index improved from +11.73% to +14.18% year to date, its largest weekly gain in the period this report has tracked. Both now stand at the top of their range. The number of contracts finishing higher went the other way, falling from 24 to 14, while the average move across the board barely shifted, from 2.24% to 2.16%. Two of the three measures agreed with each other. The one that disagreed is the one most often quoted.

Bonds made the point more plainly than any other sector. A week ago all four maturities fell by small amounts, the largest of them 0.49%, and this report called it the clearest example on the board of a structure extending itself without drama. This week the same four maturities fell again in the same order, the 30 Year Bond down 1.78%, and the sector average went from 0.30% to 1.13%. The direction did not change and the order did not change. Only the distance did, and the portfolio was paid nearly four times as much for it.

1. Trend strength and return both reached the top of the sequence in the week fewest markets rose. Breadth was measuring something else entirely.

The five-week sequence now reads 39, 50, 55, 55 and 59. The Barometer has added 29 points from the late July low of 30% and stands 7 points above the 52% that preceded that collapse. Across the three weeks it spent climbing to 55%, the SG Trend Index added 2.59 percentage points in total. Across the two weeks since, the index has added 4.49. The Barometer measured the distribution. The return figure measured the distance. Over five weeks the two have arrived at the same place by very different routes, and they were never measuring the same thing.

2. Breadth fell by ten contracts and coherence rose. Those are different measurements, and only one of them appears on the performance table.

Only 14 of 49 contracts finished higher, the narrowest upside breadth in the period this report has tracked. Read as breadth, that is a deterioration. Read as structure, it is the opposite, and the Barometer read it the second way. Equity Indices put all seven contracts in the same direction, Metals all five and Bonds all four, and three whole sectors moving as blocs is the most coherent configuration the board has produced in this sequence. A week ago Currencies had lost their common factor and Grains had stalled. This week three other sectors found one. The performance table records that 35 contracts fell. It does not record that most of them fell in the direction they were already going.

This week was a reminder that a trend follower’s worst weeks and a market’s worst weeks are different events. Thirty-five of forty-nine contracts finished lower. Equity Indices fell across the board, Metals fell across the board and Bonds fell across the board, and the SG Trend Index posted its best week of the sequence while the Barometer gave the highest reading this report has recorded. Falling markets are not bad markets for a portfolio positioned to fall with them, and rising markets are not good ones for a portfolio positioned the other way. Fourteen markets rose. Trend strength went up. Returns accelerated. All three readings were right, and a great many of the trends that paid travelled down.

The week ahead is therefore about whether the coherence of this week survives its own narrowness. The Barometer has risen to 59% and sits inside the favourable band for the first time in the period this report has tracked. Energy has carried the board for two weeks on a base that narrowed from six contracts to four, and with WTI pressing the 100 level the question is whether the petroleum complex extends again or whether Natural Gas is the first sign of the sector fragmenting. Bonds have produced two uniform declines across the curve, the second close to four times the size of the first, with all four maturities at chart lows. Metals have fallen for three consecutive weeks and this time every contract went with them. Grains have gone nowhere for a fortnight with seven of eight contracts still near their highs, a pause that will eventually resolve one way or the other. And JPY has added two consecutive gains against a decline months in the making, the first sustained move against that structure its chart has produced. In each case the question is the same one it always is: does the structure persist? For trend followers, up or down was never the central question. Persistence was. The opportunity was directional, but not directionally biased.

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List of Resources used in the Week in Review

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