XLE holds the 21 energy stocks of the S&P 500, and two of them, Exxon and Chevron, are 42% of it. The fund sits at a 52-week high with oil above $100, while the semiconductors and the Nasdaq correct: the rotation the sector table on the put screen flagged. The SMH and QQQ pages ask whether a low is forming; this one asks the opposite question of a trend at its high: how broad is it, is the oil price confirming it, is the average energy stock keeping up with the two giants, where do the dealers' strikes sit, and which of these would roll over first if the trend were ending.
The state of XLE in one paragraph. Written Friday 30 October during the session, with Thursday's close, Thursday's open interest and Friday's prices where stated. The energy sector is the market's uptrend. XLE closed Thursday at $68.71, 1.7% under its 52-week high, and trades at that high on Friday ($69.86, +1.7%) while the S&P 500 falls 1.8% and the semiconductors 8%; it is +11.7% in a month, +15.4% in three and +54% for the year, with WTI at $105 (+13% on the month, above its 50-day) doing the confirming. The trend scorecard reads seven of ten, healthy: the structure is intact (close above a rising 20-day at $66.76 and 50-day at $64.80, the 50-day above the 200-day at $58.62), the breakout over the summer base high of $67.63 is holding, 81% of the holdings are above their 50- and 200-day averages, the fund has made 22 new 52-week highs in ten sessions and no new lows, the ratio to the S&P 500 is +10.7% on the month and above its own 50-day, and both Exxon and Chevron are above their 50-day. The three amber rows describe a trend getting late rather than one breaking: Thursday's up day carried 62% of holdings; the equal-weighted basket has lagged the fund by 0.5% over a month and 3% over three, because Exxon and Chevron (42% of the weight) supplied 5.4 of the month's 11.8 points; and the dealers' largest strike is the $70 call, $46 million of gamma that sits exactly at Friday's price, where their long gamma sells into strength until new strikes are opened. Underneath, the leaders are the integrateds and the producers (Exxon, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, EOG, Targa and APA at or within 1% of their highs), the refiners are resting after parabolic years (Valero −16% from its high, Marathon −11%, Phillips 66 −8%), and the three holdings in downtrends are Baker Hughes, Expand Energy and Texas Pacific. Our read: a broad, confirmed uptrend pressing on a call wall, late in its month but not in its cycle. What would say otherwise is specific: a close below the 20-day ($66.76) with oil back under its 50-day would turn the structure and the driver rows red together, and the first new 52-week lows inside the fund would be the earlier warning. For a put seller this is the sector to sell puts in, on the pullbacks inside it (Valero, the services names) rather than on the leaders at their highs; for a call buyer the $70 wall is the obstacle until it is cleared on volume, after which the dealers' hedging turns from a cap into fuel. Monday 2 November, pre-open: Friday closed $70.02 (+1.9%), a new high, with 62% of holdings up; the scorecard is 8 of 10 (participation turned green) and the call wall has moved up to $75 with the flip at $67.9. Oil opened the week 4% lower at $99.9 on the Qatar talks; OPEC+ held December quotas on Sunday; Marathon reports Tuesday.
| Signal | Now | What green needs | Status |
|---|
Blue candles closed up, red down (Yahoo daily bars). Orange dashed: the call wall (strike with the most call gamma above the price), put wall (most put gamma below) and gamma flip (below it the dealer book turns short gamma), from CBOE open interest across all XLE expiries.
Dollars of XLE dealers must buy or sell per 1% move, by strike (price on the vertical axis, like the candle chart). Blue: gamma from calls (dealers long, they lean against moves); red: gamma from puts (dealers short, they chase moves); black: the net of the two at each strike. Dashed black: today's XLE price. Hover for the strike and gamma at the cursor.
Dealers are net long about of gamma per 1% move ( in the next 35 days), the opposite of the SMH and QQQ books. The flip is at , just under the price; above it the book is almost all calls, and the strike holds $46 million of call gamma, the largest in the chain, with $71, $72.50 and $75 behind it. The put wall is , 7% down. In positive gamma dealers sell rallies and buy dips, which is why a trending sector grinds rather than gaps: the price gets pinned near the big strikes and the daily ranges stay small. The two ways this changes: a close through $70 on volume forces the dealers to buy back the hedges on those calls, which is how a call wall in a trending sector becomes the next leg's fuel; a slide under $68 flips the book short and the move extends toward $65. Positioning uses Thursday's open interest; Friday's arrives Monday morning New York time.
Gamma comes from end-of-day open interest and a sign convention (dealers long customers' sold calls, short customers' bought puts); it shifts after each expiry, most of all the monthly ones (20 November, 18 December).
The classic breadth gauge. Above 70% on the 200-day is a healthy bull market; the 50-day swings faster and often turns before the fund (a falling line while XLE rises is a negative divergence). The 50-day line went from 29% to in a month, a breadth thrust: the October move was the whole sector, not two stocks.
Solid: share of holdings. Dashed: share of XLE's weight. When the weighted line sits above the count, the big names are in better shape than the typical stock; that is the case ( of weight above the 50-day against of names) because Exxon and Chevron, 42% of the fund, are at their highs while the refiners and Baker Hughes rest.
Bars: holdings closing at a new 52-week high (up) or low (down) each day. Line: share within 5% of their 52-week high. A healthy advance keeps producing new highs: 22 in the last ten sessions and none on the low side. The first new lows inside the fund would be the early warning that the trend is narrowing.
Running total of holdings up minus holdings down each day. If XLE makes a new high while this line does not, fewer stocks are carrying the fund.
The 19-day minus the 39-day exponential average of daily net advances (as a share of names trading). Above zero, short-term breadth momentum is rising; a cross below zero after a thrust marks momentum rolling over. With 21 holdings the line is jumpy, so read the direction over a week rather than the day. It is now.
Both rebased to 100 a year ago, rebuilt from the holdings' daily returns. A rising equal ÷ cap line means the average energy stock is beating the giants (broad rally); a falling one means Exxon and Chevron are carrying the fund. Over three months the giants did (equal-weight versus cap-weight), which is the amber row on the trend scorecard: the trend is real but its leadership has narrowed to the two largest names and the producers.
Share of holdings with the 50-day above the 200-day (the slow trend), and with a 14-day RSI above 70 (overbought) or below 30 (oversold). Clusters above 70 mark extended rallies: ConocoPhillips, EOG and APA sit at 70 today and Exxon and Chevron at 69, so the leaders are extended without the whole fund being so.
The top five holdings are of XLE and Exxon alone ; the "effective number" of stocks (one over the sum of squared weights) is , so XLE behaves like a portfolio of about nine equal positions, not 21. That is the structural caveat on every breadth measure here: the fund can make a new high on Exxon and Chevron alone, and the scorecard's participation and equal-weight rows exist to catch exactly that.
Year to date the holdings are up 52 points and five names supplied two-thirds of it: Exxon (12.6 points), Chevron (9.5), Marathon Petroleum (4.5), ConocoPhillips (4.1) and Valero (3.7), the refiners having more than doubled before their October rest. Over three months (+14.8 points) the order is Exxon 4.2, Chevron 3.1, ConocoPhillips 1.6, Marathon 1.5 and Phillips 66 1.2, with Baker Hughes, Texas Pacific and Expand Energy the only detractors. Over one month (+11.8 points) it is Exxon 3.0, Chevron 2.4, ConocoPhillips 1.3, EOG 0.7 and Targa 0.5, and the equal-weighted basket finished against the fund.
For an XLE holder: the fund's trend is Exxon's and Chevron's trend plus the oil price; the producers confirm it, the refiners have paused, the services names (Baker Hughes, Halliburton still 17% below its high) have not joined. A trend that broadens into services and the refiners' next leg would be healthier than one that keeps narrowing to the two giants, and the equal-weight line is where that shows first.
| Holding | Weight | Trend | 1W | 1M | 3M | YTD | vs 50d | vs 200d | From 52w high | RSI | 3M contrib. |
|---|
Trend: Leader above the 50- and 200-day and within 5% of its 52-week high; Uptrend above both averages; Pullback above the 200-day but below the 50-day; Recovering above the 50-day but still below the 200-day; Downtrend below both. 3M contribution is the holding's weight three months ago times its return, in percentage points of XLE's return.
Holdings and weights from stockanalysis.com (as of ; the fund's futures and cash lines are dropped), 21 holdings with price history. Daily prices: Yahoo Finance, two years, aligned to XLE's trading calendar. Weights through time are rebuilt from today's weights and each holding's price path, so cap-weighted measures move with the market rather than freezing today's mix. Moving averages are simple; RSI is Wilder's 14-day; a new high is a close at or above the highest close of the prior 252 sessions. McClellan uses ratio-adjusted net advances ((advancers − decliners) ÷ (advancers + decliners) × 100). Equal- and cap-weighted indices are rebuilt from daily returns. WTI is Yahoo's front-month future (CL=F); relative strength is XLE divided by SPY. Dealer gamma: CBOE delayed chain, recomputed with Black-Scholes, built .
Scorecard thresholds: above the 200-day ≥70% green, ≤40% red; above the 50-day ≥60% / ≤40%; above the 20-day ≥60% / ≤40%; within 5% of a high ≥40% / ≤15%; equal- minus cap-weighted over 3 months ≥0 / ≤−5%; top-five share of the 3-month return ≤60% / ≥100%; RSI above 70 ≤30% / ≥60%; gamma regime positive / negative. These are conventions for a 21-stock sector fund, not optimised signals. The trend health scorecard's rules are in its footnote. The prose is written for the date shown; the charts and tiles update when the page is rebuilt (uv run python -m options_scanner.smh_breadth XLE).