Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The S&P 500 (unch) has trimmed its modest early gains with top-weighted technology (+0.8%) outperforming the market while eight of the remaining ten sectors trade lower.

The outperformance in tech comes amid:

• Relative strength in large and mega cap names masking losses in roughly half of the components of the sector.
• Anticipation ahead of tonight's release of quarterly results from Micron (MU 126.42, -1.49, -1.2%).
• Quarter-end flows. The technology sector has been the best performer in Q2, having gained 21.3% versus an 8.7% quarter-to-date advance in the S&P 500.

Chip names like Super Micro Computer (SMCI 45.83, +2.99, +7.0%) NVIDIA (NVDA 152.81, +4.91, +3.3%), and AMD (AMD 142.72, +4.29, +3.1%) are among today's leaders in technology with NVDIA recieveing an extra boost from a target price increase to $250 from $175 at Loop Capital.

Just reported, Wall Street Journal reports that Shell plc (SHEL 68.22, -1.92, -2.7%) is in early talks to acquire BP (BP 32.09, +2.26, +7.6%)