YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: The stock market slipped in the first few minutes of trading, but was able to recover and log its best single-session advance by percent in two weeks. The advance was broad-based as six of the 10 major sectors in the S&P 500 posted a gain.

There wasn't any individual leader behind the move. Instead, health care (+2.2%), financials (+2.5%), utilities (+2.3%), and consumer staples stocks (+1.9%) all made impressive gains.

Health care stocks outperformed the broader market for the third straight session. The latest advance came via support from managed care (+6.2%) and healthcare facilities (+3.9%) amid an increased possibility that healthcare reform is going to be costlier and less expansive than expected.

The financial sector was helped by regional banks (+3.2%), which snapped back from the prior session's marked decline, and consumer finance stocks (+1.0%), which followed the lead of Discover Financial (DFS 9.28, +0.37). Discover issued a pleasing quarterly report and had a relatively encouraging conference call, during which the company stated it will repay its TARP funds when it is prudent to do so.

Amid ongoing chatter regarding its intended offer for NRG Energy (NRG 23.81, +1.06) and recent efforts to restructure its executive lineup and reduce costs, Exelon (EXC 50.42, +1.99) was a leader among utilities.

Consumer staples stocks were led by J.M. Smucker (SJM 47.88, +4.24), which posted better-than-expected quarterly earnings and raised its guidance.

Retailers traded with weakness for the entire session and finished 1.3% lower. Semiconductor stocks also lagged, leading the Semiconductor Index to a 1.8% loss. Weakness among semiconductors weighed on tech stocks (-0.5%) and caused the Nasdaq to underperform the other headline indices.

Trading volume in the broader market was exceptionally low this session. Hardly 1 billion shares exchanged hands on the NYSE this session. Trading volume has averaged 1.5 billion shares during the course of the last 50 sessions.

Nonetheless, this session's solid, broad-based gains came on the back of the latest jobless claims report, which indicated that 608,000 initial claims were filed for the week ending June 13. Continuing claims came in at 6.69 million. Initial claims were in-line with expectations and continue to trend lower, but continuing claims made a surprise pullback from record highs. However, both numbers remain at disconcerting levels.

In other economic news, the Philadelphia Fed Index for June came in with a less dismal-than-expected reading and leading economic indicators for May increased slightly more than expected.

Treasuries were knocked sharply lower after the Treasury Department announced a series of auctions for next week. The auction will carry amounts that exceed what was expected, which pressured the benchmark 10-year Note and sent its yield up above 3.8%.

Treasury Secretary Geithner provided testimony to Congress about financial regulatory reform. His comments didn't have any meaningful impact on trading.DJ30 +58.42 NASDAQ -0.34 NQ100 -0.1% R2K +0.5% SP400 +0.7% SP500 +7.66 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1403/2.08 bln/1239 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1741/1.09 bln/1263