YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: The major equity averages finished with fractional losses. The lack of news flow resulted in especially light volume.

Market participants returned their focus to the tribulations of Greece amid an absence of economic data and market-moving corporate reports. Frustration and disappointment over Greece's ongoing struggles with austerity measures and creditors prompted participants to clip stocks this morning. More rumors regarding a potential agreement made their rounds, but stocks showed little trust in them.

The euro was able to overcome early weakness and score itself a gain against the greenback. As of session's end, the euro was up 0.2% against the dollar.

Although the broad market remained in the red for the entire session, the major equity averages were able to turn a modest decline into only a fractional loss.

Broad market action may have been lackluster, but energy stocks put on an impressive performance. They staged a steady ascent that saw the sector settle at its session high with a 1.1% gain. What's more, the move came in the face of softer oil prices, which fell nearly 1% to about $97 per barrel.

In contrast, financials lagged for the entire session. They settled with a 0.5% loss, which isn't severe, but it still makes for one of the poorest performances among the 10 major sectors.

Medco Health Solutions (MHS 58.47, -5.14) put on one of the poorest individual performances in response to headlines that about potential disruptions to plan to acquire Express Scripts (ESRX 49.67, -2.42).

Participation in recent months has regularly been very light, but the dearth of headlines today took share volume to an abysmal level. In fact, the near 690 million shares that were traded on the NYSE made today one of the lightest non-holiday sessions of the past decade.

News flow will pick up some tomorrow. On the earnings docket are BP (BP 46.87, +0.30), Coca-Cola (KO 68.03, -0.05), and UBS (UBS 14.37, -0.30). Tuesday also brings a testimony to the Senate Budget Committee from Fed Chairman Bernanke, whose comments are unlikely to deviate from those he delivered last week to the House Budget Committee, and the latest in consumer credit.

Commodities closed mixed after a weak start. That helped lift the CRB Index out of the red for a flat finish.

Oil was unable to attract much support. As a result, it logged a 0.8% loss at $96.99 per barrel. However, natural gas prices pushed out of the red to close pit trade at $2.55 per MMBtu for a 0.8% gain.

Among precious metals, gold settled with a 1.0% loss at $1723.00 per ounce, but silver shook free from sellers to settle at $33.76 per ounce for a gain of a few cents.

Advancing Sectors: Energy +1.1%, Telecom +0.3%
Unchanged: Consumer Staples, Tech
Declining Sectors: Consumer Discretionary -0.1%, Industrials -0.2%, Utilities -0.4%, Health Care -0.4%, Materials -0.5%, Financials -0.5%DJ30 -17.10 NASDAQ -3.67 NQ100 +0.00% R2K -0.3% SP400 -0.1% SP500 -0.57 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1025/1.67 bln/1505 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1235/686 mln/1770