Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] It has been a tough day for the stock market, but things have gotten a little less tough over the past few hours. The S&P 500 is roughly 150 points above its lows for the day, but even so, it is still down 3.1% in today's session.

It has been worse for the Nasdaq Composite, which is down 3.9%. The upshot is that it was up 12.2% yesterday.

Clearly, there is more of a defensive tone in today's session. The consumer staples sector (+0.4%) is the lone sector in positive territory, while the utilities sector (-0.2%) is little changed. Losses for the other nine sectors range from 2.0% (real estate) to 6.3% (energy).

The CBOE Volatility Index is up 22.2% to 41.08.