Wall Street pared early losses to close day little changed

After falling sharply on revived political concerns over the relationship between Russia and the Trump election campaign, major equity indexes in the U.S. recovered their losses to close the day virtually flat on Tuesday.

"I think people are worried that it just means more political uncertainty, and sort of a continuation of the stalemate in Washington, a continuation of the delay in trying to get the Trump agenda passed through Congress," Robert Pavlik, chief market strategist at Boston Private Wealth in New York, told Reuters.

Tomorrow, Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen will start her two-day testimony, in which investors will look for any clues regarding the start of the massive balance sheet reduction. Ahead of Yellen's testimony,  Board of Governors member Lael Brainard crossed the wires on Tuesday and said that the pace, timing & approach of the balance sheet run off by major central banks may have spillover effects on the FX rates and financial conditions.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average average gained only 0.55 points to close the day at 21,409.07 while the S&P 500 was virtually unchanged at 2,424.48. Finally, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite added 17.65 on the back of another solid performance by tech shares and finished the day at 6,171.25.

Headlines from the U.S. session:

• US Sen. Rep. Leader McConnell: Will lay out a revised version of healthcare law on Thursday morning
• US: Job openings slip in May - Wells Fargo
• Fed’s balance sheet could normalise between 2020 and 2023 - UOB
• US Dollar drops sharply on dovish Brainard comments
• US Senate Intelligence Committee requesting documents from Trump Jr. - Reuters
• Fed’s Brainard: If econ data holds up, would be appropriate to begin shrinking b/sheet soon
• Easy financial conditions signal US surprise index surge - Westpac
• Thoughts on the US policy mix - BBH
• US: Business Optimism dropped in June - Wells Fargo