Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The stock market has moved comfortably off its lows for the session, bolstered by President Trump's pronouncement that he is sure that he will talk to President Xi and hopefully work things out. That is an open-ended prospect; nonetheless, market participants liked the softer tone relative to his pre-open exclamation, "So much for being MR. NICE GUY!"

Once again, the S&P 500 is vacillating around the 5,900 level, which has served as a baseline of sorts in this week's trading that has seen the S&P 500 move as high as 5,943 and as low as 5,843.

As of now, the S&P 500 is up 1.7% for the week, which is nice in its own right but entirely a function of Tuesday's rally, when it rallied 2.1% after the president said he would defer the 50% tariff rate for the EU until July 9 to allow more time to negotiate a deal.

The consumer staples sector (+1.4%), led by Costco (COST 1049.6, +40.42, +4.0%) after its earnings report, is the best-performing sector and the only sector up or down at least 1.0%.