Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The S&P 500 (flat) Nasdaq Composite (flat), and DJIA (flat) remain pinned to their flatlines as the session approaches midday. The Russell 2000 (flat) and S&P Mid Cap 400 (-0.1%) are in the midst of similar subdued performances. 

A lack of conviction on the part of buyers and sellers keeps breadth figures thin, with decliners leading advancers by just a few dozen names on the NYSE while advancers hold a roughly 11-to-8 edge on the Nasdaq. 

Five S&P 500 sectors trade higher, while five trade lower. The industrials sector trades flat. 

The energy sector (+1.8%) is once again an outlier, supported by a $1.27 increase in the price of oil to $64.68 per barrel, an increase of 2.0%.

The consumer discretionary sector (+0.8) also makes a nice upwards move, benefitting from strong leadership in Tesla (TSLA 439.26, +13.41, +3.15%) and strength in homebuilders after the release of a strong August New Home Sales report (800,000; Briefing.com consensus 650,000).

Mega-cap strength, however, is largely limited to the consumer discretionary sector. The Vanguard Mega Cap Growth ETF is down 0.2% today as the largest names in the information technology sector (-0.4%) underperform. 

Neither Micron's (MU 162.80, -3.61, -2.17%) impressive earnings report nor headlines of a massive AI infrastructure push from Oracle (ORCL 305.93, -7.90, -2.52%), OpenAI, and Softbank (SFTBY 63.84, +2.22, +3.60%) have prompted any sort of buy-the-dip action after yesterday's retreat.