Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] Not much change in today's general trends since the last update. Notably, micro-cap stocks and small-cap stocks continue to outperform their larger-cap counterparts and are suggestive of some increased speculative activity as the broader market continues to forge ahead with its recovery effort from the April 7 lows.

The pause on the reciprocal tariffs was instrumental in facilitating and precipitating the turnaround. It seems almost fitting, then, that trade discussions are back in the headline mix today and that they have some hopeful elements.

Specifically, top trade representatives from the U.S. and China are meeting in London today, and The Wall Street Journal reports that President Trump gave Treasury Secretary Bessent the authority to negotiate away export controls on technology products to China as part of the trade talks.

The information technology sector (+0.7%) continues to sit atop today's sector rankings, with semiconductor stocks outperforming. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (+2.3%) is up sharply in the early going.