YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: August finished on a flat note after a bit of end-of-month buying fizzled into the close. The lackluster finish left stocks to lock in another marked monthly loss.

Technical support at the 1040 line helped the S&P 500 bounce back from an opening slide. The rebound initially paused near the neutral line, but stocks then pushed into positive territory with the release of the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index for August. The Index climbed to 53.5 from 51.0. It was widely expected to slip to 50.0.

The broader market gave more weight to the consumer confidence reading than the generally anecdotal and entirely regional Chicago PMI, which came in at 56.7 for August. Not only did that figure fall short of the consensus of 57.0, but it was also the lowest since November 2009.

There was little reaction among market participants to the minutes from the August 10 FOMC meeting. As expressed in Fed Chairman Bernanke's speech last week, the minutes indicated that the pace of the economic recovery slowed in recent months. However, many policymakers judged that downside risks to the U.S. recovery had become somewhat larger.

Interest among buyers has been unsustainable in recent weeks, but there was some modest end-of-month buying, which helped drive some midsession gains and took trading volume above recent averages. However, many participants remain unwilling to jump back into stocks ahead of the monthly payrolls report. A glimpse into the official figures (due Friday) will come with the ADP Employment Change tomorrow morning. Caution ahead of the report left stocks to crawl to a flat finish.

Weakness of the past couple of weeks culminated with a 4.7% loss for the S&P 500 during August. That poor performance marks the stock market's third monthly loss in four months.

Amid such weakness the yield on the 10-year Note fell more than 40 basis points to close out August near 2.47%. It registered its 19-month low of 2.42% just last week.

Though stocks have been weak in recent weeks and there is a growing concern about the tenuous footing of the economy, merger and acquisition activity continues on. Most recently, Exelon (EXC 40.72, +0.20) announced it will acquire the renewable energy unit of Deere & Co. (DE 63.27, +0.29) in a deal valued at some $900 million.

Dow component 3M (MMM 78.55, -1.10) will pay an investor group $230 million to acquire Attenti Holdings S.A. That announcement came after 3M agreed to acquire Cogent (COGT 11.00, -0.09) just yesterday.

In other corporate news, Monsanto (MON 52.65, -3.25) issued a tepid revenue forecast, which caused it to fall sharply out of favor. Shares of MON were among this session's worst performing issues.

The CRB Commodity Index ended lower by 1.3% today, led by the substantial 2.4% sell off in the energy sector. That sell off was anchored by Oct crude oil, which shed 3.7% to settle at $71.92 per barrel. The flight from risk assets, to safety, weighed on crude oil today. Sept natural gas closed higher by 0.1% to $3.82 per MMBtu.

Precious metals were the largest advancing sector today, adding 1.2%. Dec gold finished higher up 0.8% to $1250.30 per ounce, while Dec silver settled up 1.5% to $19.43 per ounce. Concerns about the state of the economy lead to a flight to safety today. Gold put in session highs at $1251.80 -its best level in two months.

Advancing Sectors: Telecom (+1.1%), Financials (+0.9%), Utilities (+0.4%), Materials (+0.3%), Consumer Staples (+0.2%), Consumer Discretionary (+0.1%)
Declining Sectors: Tech (-0.6%), Health Care (-0.4%), Industrials (-0.3%), Energy (-0.2%)DJ30 +4.99 NASDAQ -5.94 NQ100 -0.3% R2K +0.1% SP400 +0.00% SP500 +0.41 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1264/2.12 bln/1320 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1654/1.40 bln/1332