RE: Fair Value, premium, discount http://www.indexarb.com/ or http://www.programtrading.com/buysell.htm
bad entry but for scalps, much better 58-59 so adding there and holding. chance of a moderate winner is worth it. stop at 61.50. Edit: no fill but holding position.
Why not wait til after lunch hour before going short/long? There is a lot of time for the lunch hour chop to finish. 15-min looks bullish for a continuation long to retest high. Other time frames offer a mixed picture. About premium, when it gets close to expiration, fair value of future can be a discount to cash if the interest rate is low enough (like now) and that there is not much dividend from the stocks.
Generally speaking there is usually a premium (or should be) also known as "cost of carry". It comes from the stocks in the index paying dividends, and the futures not. As we are getting close to expiration, the difference slowly disappears. In normal times it is quite big, last year it was around 3 ES points per month. Now in bear market times it is much less or the difference can go negative because the market expects the future being less rosy. Google "cost of carry" if you want to know more about it.
Yes. Liquidity dried up since 840 reached ... as if there is nothing else to do today and people leave early. These days 4K contracts traded per minute is low volume