S&P 500 opens little changed, energy shares post modest gains

• S&P 500 stays relatively quiet near 3,100 points on Thursday.
• The Energy Index is posting modest gains on rising crude oil prices.

Wall Street's main indexes started the day little changed on Thursday amid a lack of significant fundamental drivers. As of writing, the S&P 500 was down 0.18% on the day at 3,108 points while the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.45% and the Nasdaq Composite was unchanged at 9,980 points. 

Investors ignore US data 

Earlier in the day, the weekly data published by the US Department of Labor revealed that 1.5 million Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week. On a positive note, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia's Manufacturing Index jumped to 27.5 in June from -43.1 in May and beat the market expectation of -23.

Reflecting the neutral market environment, the CBOE Volatility Index, Wall Street's fear gauge, is up only 0.5% on the day.

Among the 11 major S&P 500 sectors, the Energy Index is up 0.75% on the day as the top performer. On the other hand, the Real Estate is down 1.15%.