YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: A surprisingly strong increase in pending home sales and considerable strength in the financial sector struggled to prop up stocks and keep choppy trading at bay, but a late move by buyers made for a strong finish.

Stocks started the session in negative territory as participants were left largely unimpressed by the latest batch of earnings announcements, which didn't contain any real market movers. News that June personal income fell a larger-than-expected 1.3% and June spending made a generally in-line 0.4% increase also failed to stir action.

However, a much better-than-expected monthly increase of 3.6% for June pending home sales bounced stocks off of morning lows. The move proved unsustainable, but financials emerged to provide support to the broader market.

Financials stocks were down more than 1% in the early going, but rebounded to settle with an 2.1% gain, just shy of their session high. There wasn't any particular catalyst to account for the sharp reversal from red to green other than momentum buying. That momentum helped carry the major indices into positive territory midsession.

Despite leadership from the financial sector, the broader market was unable to break free from its fit of choppiness. Still, the apparent instability couldn't disrupt a strong advance into the close that gave stocks their fourth straight advance.

The stock market's latest winning streak has only added to an already impressive run that has stocks up nearly 15% in just over three weeks. Such a strong move has many calling for a pullback, but buyers remain in control.

Amid an increased willingness to move into stocks and take on risk, small-caps in the Russell 2000 and mid-caps in the S&P 400 outperformed the headline indices this session. Small- and mid-caps tacked on 0.9% and 0.8%, respectively.

Meanwhile, Treasuries fell out of favor after starting the session in higher ground. The benchmark 10-year Note shed some 12 ticks, which pushed its yield back toward 3.7%. The yield had been above 3.7% midway through the session.DJ30 +33.63 NASDAQ +2.70 NQ100 +0.0% R2K +0.9% SP400 +0.8% SP500 +3.02 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1509/2.27 bln/1153 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1851/1.25 bln/1168