Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The broader market hasn't been charged with much excitement today -- not yet anyway. Anything is possible, but participants continue to wait on details coming out of the U.S.-China trade talks in London.

Reports that Treasury Secretary Bessent has been given the authority to negotiate away export controls on technology products to China have given the semiconductor stocks an added lift. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index is up 1.9%, leaving it far ahead of an S&P 500 that is little changed for the session.

Today's relative strength has accrued mostly to the micro-cap stocks, small-cap stocks, and high-beta stocks, which is a reflection of the speculative activity that persists below the index surface. That is typical in bullish-minded markets like this one in the absence of a trend-altering catalyst.

The S&P 500, for its part, has shown an aversion thus far to trading below 6,000, having reclaimed that level on a closing basis on Friday for the first time since February 21.

The information technology sector (+0.4%) is its main source of support today, but sector rankings show the materials (+0.7%) and energy (+0.5%) sectors at the top of today's leaderboard.

The Russell 2000 is up 0.5%; the Nasdaq Composite is up 0.3%; the S&P 500 is up 0.1%; and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 0.1%.