Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The major averages sport solid midday gains with the S&P 500 (+1.0%) and Dow (+0.9%) trading a bit behind the Nasdaq (+1.5%).

The market is enjoying a strong start to the new week after last week ended with growing concerns about the potential for the Israel-Iran conflict to escalate and draw the U.S. into the fray. However, the market has been encouraged by the fact that the weekend went by without a major change in the tense situation in the Middle East.

The early advance has reversed the bulk of Friday's drop with seven sectors holding midday gains, led by the market's largest sectors like technology (+1.7%), consumer discretionary (+1.1%), and financials (+1.5%).

Chipmakers have played a big part in the outperformance of the technology sector, as the PHLX Semiconductor Index (+3.2%) extends its June gain to 10.8%. AMD (AMD 127.78, +11.62, +10.0%) has been the best performer of the bunch amid CNBC speculation that the company is in line to receive a supply deal from Amazon's (AMZN 215.11, +3.01, +1.4%) AWS.

Elsewhere in technology, top component Microsoft (MSFT 479.88, +4.92, +1.0%) is cruising to a fresh record high, helping put the iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV 107.50, +1.23, +1.2%) on track for its best close since mid-February.

The financials sector has benefited from broad-based strength, including leadership from credit providers like Capital One Financial (COF 198.72, +5.89, +3.1%) and American Express (AXP 295.63, +7.84, +2.7%). Payment processors Visa (V 356.61, +3.76, +1.1%) and Mastercard (MA 571.07, +9.04, +1.6%) are recovering some of their big losses from Friday, which followed reports that Walmart (WMT 94.82, +0.38, +0.4%) and Amazon are looking into stable coin issuance that would draw some business away from established payment processing names.

On the downside, energy (-0.6%) and health care (-0.3%) have spent the first half in negative territory with energy narrowing its June gain to 7.4% amid a reversal in the price of oil. WTI crude is down $1.50, or 2.1%, at $71.52/bbl, giving back some of its Friday gain after The Wall Street Journal reported that Iran has signaled willingness to de-escalate its conflict with Israel.

Treasuries are little changed after a range-bound start to the day. The 10-yr yield is flat at 4.42% after spending the first half in a four-basis point range.

Today's economic data was limited to the Empire State Manufacturing survey (-16.0; Briefing.com consensus -6.6), which was a disappointment.