No Edge, No Direction, No Problem – Theta Doesn’t Care | SPX Market Briefing | 23 Feb 2026

After another long weekend – because, well, why not – we return to the markets once again to discover what fresh chaos the overnight session delivered. And oh my, did it deliver.

Pop and drop. Futures dropped 55 S&P points on the SCOTUS tariff euphoria, then proceeded to hand it back. Currently sitting about 20 points in the red. More than a blip. Less than a full-blown panic. A little racey.

Here’s what happened whilst you were enjoying your weekend: the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s IEEPA tariffs 6-3 on Friday. Markets rallied. Then Trump signed a 10% global tariff that same evening. Then raised it to 15% on Saturday. The new tariffs take effect tomorrow morning at midnight. The 150-day clock starts ticking.

Meanwhile, Friday’s data dropped like a brick through a greenhouse roof. GDP printed 1.4% versus the 3.0% consensus. Core PCE hit 3.0%. Stagflation fears aren’t whispers anymore – they’re shouting from the rooftops.

Bitcoin? Don’t ask Kash. Crashed 4.5% Sunday to $64,200. Down 49% from its October peak. The Fear Index hit 14. Bitdeer – the largest public miner by hashrate – dumped its entire Bitcoin treasury to zero. Every. Last. Coin.

And as we step into the final week of February, we enter the Feb/Mar crash and correction window. Last year gave us a muted 5% corrective move. This year? I’m looking for the elusive 10% in 10 days.

The charts are a mess. The news is chaos. The only directional edge right now is simple theta decay. Premium Poppers and a bit of opening scalping are keeping my traders and me sane.

Be the bear. PopPop.

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Market Briefing:

The Weekend That Rewrote Trade

Friday’s SCOTUS ruling was supposed to be the big relief rally. The Supreme Court struck down Trump’s IEEPA tariffs in a decisive 6-3 ruling. Chief Justice Roberts delivered the majority opinion: IEEPA does not authorize the President to impose tariffs. Markets surged. SPX closed at 6,909.51, up 0.69%. Nasdaq jumped 0.9%. Alphabet popped 3.7%.

Then the music stopped.

Within hours, Trump signed a 10% global tariff under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. By Saturday, he’d raised it to 15% – the maximum allowed. It takes effect tomorrow at 12:01 AM. The 150-day clock starts, after which Congress must act or the tariffs expire in July.

Here’s the kicker – Section 122 has never been used before. Trade experts at Fortune and the Cato Institute are already arguing it’s legally questionable because the required “balance-of-payments deficit” condition may not exist under modern floating exchange rates. [Source: Fortune – “Trump’s plan B to impose new tariffs is also illegal” – fortune.com]

The Yale Budget Lab estimates the new 15% tariff brings the effective rate to 13.7%, costing households between $800 and $1,300 annually depending on whether Congress extends it. [Source: Yale Budget Lab – “State of Tariffs: February 21, 2026” – budgetlab.yale.edu]

And then there’s the $133 billion question. That’s what the government collected in IEEPA tariffs now ruled unlawful. Companies are lining up for refunds. Trump says it’ll be “litigated for the next two years.” TD Securities estimates refunds could take 12-18 months to roll out. [Source: NPR – “After the Supreme Court’s ruling, companies line up for refunds” – npr.org]

The net effect: Friday’s rally evaporated. Monday futures dropped 55 points overnight before clawing most of it back. Currently sitting about 20 in the red. A little racey.

The Stagflation Data

Friday’s economic data was the other shoe dropping. GDP printed 1.4% versus the 3.0% consensus. That’s not a miss. That’s a different postcode.

Core PCE hit 3.0%. Growth slowing. Prices not. The textbook definition of stagflation.

Fed cuts have been pushed to June. The Warsh nomination adds hawkish uncertainty. The 10-year sits at 4.07%, pricing in a Fed that’s stuck between a rock and a very uncomfortable place.

The Crypto Carnage

Bitcoin crashed 4.5% in two hours on Sunday, falling to $64,200 – its lowest since 5 Feb. Down 49% from the October peak. The Fear and Greed Index hit 14 – extreme fear territory.

But the real signal? Bitdeer, the world’s largest public miner by self-managed hashrate, liquidated its entire Bitcoin treasury. 943 BTC from reserves plus all newly mined coins. Balance: zero. They’re pivoting to AI data centers and cloud infrastructure. [Source: Bitdeer official X post, 21 Feb 2026]

It’s not just Bitdeer. Vitalik Buterin has sold over 7,000 ETH ($15.5M) in recent weeks. ETH dropped below $1,875. The insiders are leaving the building.

Open interest dropped to $19.5B, far below the 2026 peak of $38.3B. Liquidations topped $466M. [Source: Coinpedia – “Crypto News Today” – coinpedia.org]

This Week’s Landmines

Tuesday: State of the Union address. Trump’s first since SCOTUS rebuke. New Section 122 tariffs take effect. Wednesday: Nvidia earnings – street expects $65.6B revenue, $1.52 EPS. Q1 guidance near $71-75B is the catalyst. Thursday: Iran talks resume in Geneva. Two carriers plus 120 aircraft positioned. Trump warns 10-15 days. Also this week: Home Depot and Alibaba Tuesday, Salesforce and Lowe’s Wednesday, Dell and Intuit Thursday.

The Feb/Mar Correction Window

We’ve just stepped into it. The Stock Trader’s Almanac data shows February averages a measly 0.001% gain since 1950 and has actually averaged a 0.4% loss over the past 21 years. Post-election year Marches tend to be softer as well. [Source: Stock Trader’s Almanac / Jeff Hirsch]

Last year’s February-April correction ran roughly 19%. The subsequent October-November drop added another 6%. This year’s correction window has plenty of ammunition: stagflation data, tariff chaos, crypto carnage, geopolitical risk, and Nvidia as the single point of failure for the entire AI narrative.

I’m looking for 10% in 10 days. The elusive sharp correction rather than last year’s drawn-out 5% muted moves.

Be the bear. PopPop.

Multi-Market Status

• ES: 6,903 area – dropped 55 points overnight, clawed back to ~20 below Friday’s close. ATR 79.26 on SPX daily. Fiddler’s elbow.

• YM: 49,523 – lost 180 points from Friday. Tariff-sensitive.

• NQ: 24,991 – down 0.9% premarket. Software sector crushed, down 20% YTD. Nvidia Wednesday.

• RTY: 2,655 – Bearish TnT Below 2,658.66, grinding toward 2,625.83 target. Uncle Russell leading the weakness.

• GC: 5,166 – surged above $5,080 on safe-haven demand. Making a move for higher ground.

• CL: 65.87 – Iran premium with two carrier groups positioned. Crude holding six-month elevated levels.

• VIX: 20.10 – holding higher lows despite rangebound SPX. Elevated concerns being priced in. This is the VIX channel holding form.

• BTC/USD: 65,815 – crashed from October peak. Fear Index 14. Bitdeer treasury at zero. Miners pivoting to AI.

• NYSE Advance-Decline: 487 (neutral purple zone, near center line)

SPX Technical

Daily: SPX at 6,867.56. NATHs (New All-Time Highs) marked at 7,002.28 but feel like ancient history this morning. Price sitting mid-channel, ATR 79.26 giving decent daily ranges.

30-Min TnT:

• Bullish Above: 6,803.43

• PFZ Level: 6,775.5

• Target: 6,909.91

Bollinger Band %b: 0.81 – price in upper portion of the bands but not stretched.

MACD-v: Watching for momentum shifts. The indicator that matters on the lower panel.

The read: Up a day, down a day, like a fiddler’s elbow. No real directional edge beyond theta decay. The TnT says bullish above 6,803 but the conviction isn’t there when futures are dropping 55 points overnight on a weekend’s worth of chaos. Follow the rules mechanically or apply a little discretion given the yoyo moves – either way, Premium Poppers and opening scalps are the play.

RUT Technical (Uncle Russell)

Daily: RUT at 2,663.78 with upper resistance at 2,735.10.

30-Min TnT:

• Bearish Below: 2,658.66

• PFZ Level: 2,682.42

• Target: 2,625.83

RUT is right at the Bearish Below line. If this holds, we’re grinding toward that 2,625 target. Small caps leading the weakness, as they do when tariff uncertainty spikes and risk appetite evaporates.

1 – The $160B refund is a stealth stimulus nobody’s pricing. Penn Wharton Budget Model estimates at least $160B in IEEPA tariffs collected through 20 Feb. That money was legally extracted from importers. It now needs to come back. TD Securities says 12-18 months for refunds. But here’s what nobody’s discussing: those refunds, when they arrive, function as a corporate stimulus. Companies that took out loans to cover tariffs get balance sheet relief. Those that froze hiring get capital freed up. The refund timeline creates a delayed economic tailwind sometime in late 2026 or early 2027 – precisely when the Section 122 tariffs expire in July and uncertainty peaks again. The sequencing matters.

[Source: Penn Wharton Budget Model, TD Securities, NPR]

2 – Bitcoin miners aren’t selling Bitcoin. They’re selling Bitcoin mining. Bitdeer’s treasury liquidation isn’t panic. It’s strategy. The company is raising $325M through convertible notes to fund AI data centers. MARA just bought French computing company Exaion. TeraWulf, Bitfarms, Riot, Core Scientific – all pivoting capacity from mining to AI cloud. The mining industry discovered that the same power infrastructure generates substantially higher returns running AI workloads than mining BTC. Bitcoin mining stocks are quietly becoming AI infrastructure plays. The crypto-to-AI capital migration may be the most important structural shift the market isn’t watching.

[Source: Bitdeer X post 21 Feb, Yahoo Finance, MARA acquisition filing]

3 – Section 122’s 150-day clock expires 24 Jul. That’s Nvidia’s Q2 earnings week. The tariff expiry creates a binary convergence. Congress either extends (requires legislation, unlikely given current dynamics) or 15% drops to zero on the same week the AI narrative gets its next major data point. JPMorgan’s base case: average tariff rate settles around 9-10%. But the path between now and July involves Section 301 investigations, Section 232 expansions, and potentially new IEEPA-adjacent legal theories. Markets will need to price each one. The volatility isn’t going away – it’s moving to a different calendar.

[Source: JPMorgan note 20 Feb, White House Proclamation, CFR analysis]

Expert Insights:

Why Theta Decay Is Your Only Friend in a Fiddler’s Elbow Market

When the market moves up a day, down a day, and the charts look like a mess with no directional edge – the only consistent winner is time. Every passing hour, every overnight session, every weekend that expires does one thing reliably: it chips away at option premium.

That’s what Premium Poppers exploit. Not direction. Not prediction. Not news. Just the mechanical reality that option prices decay whether the market goes up, down, or does absolutely nothing.

In yoyo markets like this one, the systematic advantage is simple. You don’t need to know which way the SCOTUS rules. You don’t need to predict Trump’s Saturday tweets. You don’t need to guess Nvidia’s guidance number. You need theta working in your favor whilst everyone else tries to guess direction.

Premium selling doesn’t care about your opinion. It cares about time.

Fun Fact:

The Tariff Law That Hasn’t Been Used Since 1974 Section 122 sat untouched for 52 years until Friday night

Trump’s new 15% global tariff relies on Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, a provision no president has ever invoked. The law was designed for balance-of-payments emergencies during the Bretton Woods era. It caps tariffs at 15% and limits them to 150 days without Congressional approval, making it the most obscure trade weapon deployed in modern American history.

Trade well,
T2 Markets

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