Stock Market Update

[BRIEFING.COM] The S&P 500 (+0.5%) is back near its opening level after facing some selling pressure over the past three hours. Today's opening rally lifted the benchmark index back above its 50-day moving average (7705), but the subsequent pullback has pressured it back below that mark.

Even with the pullback from its morning high, the market has been able to stay in positive territory thanks to solid gains in just two sectors—technology (+1.2%) and consumer discretionary (+2.6%). Communication services (+0.2%) and materials (+0.3%) also trade in positive territory, but much closer to their flat lines. This makes for a mirror image of action seen last week where weakness in technology was countered, but not fully offset, by gains in most other sectors.

Besides the lack of strength in most sectors, the market has had to contend with intraday selling in the Treasury market (10-yr yield +4 bps to 5.14%), which has given back a portion of last week's gains, and continued upward pressure on oil, which has WTI crude just $3/bbl below its high from September (106.75). Oil dipped back below $100/bbl to begin the week amid some speculation about another U.S.-Iran deal taking shape, but that speculation has not translated into any concrete reports so far today.