Main U.S. indexes churn near flat; chips up, FANGS down Comm svcs weakest major S&P sector; real estate leads gainers Euro STOXX 600 index slips ~0.2% Dollar, crude lower; gold, bitcoin rise U.S. 10-Year Treasury yield ~flat at ~1.51% Dec 31 - Welcome to the home for real-time coverage of markets brought to you by Reuters reporters. You can share your thoughts with us at markets.research@thomsonreuters.com OUT WITH A WHIMPER (1023 EST/1523 GMT) U.S. stocks paused on Friday, after a recent rally put Wall Street"s main indexes on pace to finish the year with handsome gains driven by massive stimulus, vaccine rollouts, and strong retail participation. Indeed, the main U.S. indexes are virtually flat in the early throes of the last trading day of the year. With this, a majority of major S&P 500 (.SPX) sectors are showing net changes ranging from -0.1% to +0.1% on the day. Meanwhile, volume across all U.S. exchanges for the week now stands at just over 33 billion shares, putting it on track for the slowest share turnover since the week ending February 21, 2020. Still, the SPX is on track to rise just over 27% for the year, the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC) just over 22%, and the Dow Industrials (.DJI) about 19%. The small-cap Russell 2000 (.RUT) is up just over 14% year-to-date. Additionally, the SPX, DJI, and IXIC are on track for their biggest rolling 3-year percentage gains since 1999. Here is where markets now stand: earlytrade12312021 earlytrade12312021 (Terence Gabriel) ***** IN 2021, THE S&P 500 ALMOST PARTIED LIKE IT WAS 1995 (0900 EST/1400 GMT) With just one trading day to go in 2021, the S&P 500 (.SPX) is posting a 27.2% gain for the year. That"s its biggest yearly rise since a 28.9% advance in 2019. Video game retailer GameStop (GME.N), theater operator AMC Entertainment (AMC.N) and online brokerage Robinhood Markets (HOOD.O) were prominent amid meme stock mania read more , while Coinbase Global (COIN.O) capitalized on the cryptocurrency craze with its public listing. read more On the IPO front, EV maker Rivian Automotive Inc"s (RIVN.O) $12 billion deal was the biggest since Alibaba"s (9988.HK) 2014 public debut. read more This as record-setting IPO and SPAC issuance in 2021 will be a tough act to follow. read more Of note, however, it can be said that 2021 was also one big party for record-high closes. Through Thursday, the benchmark index has registered 70 record-high closes, or the second most ever. Using Refinitiv data back to 1928, the most SPX record-high closes in a single year was 77 in 1995: SPXRecordHighCloses12312021 SPXRecordHighCloses12312021 Back in 1995, the S&P 500 rose 34.1%. The next year, it only recorded 39 record-high closes, and its gain slowed. Nevertheless, it turned out to be a very respectable 20.3% rise. Not including this year, the SPX has averaged about 14 record-high closes per year. Prior to 2021, the S&P 500 has registered more than 40 record-high closes in any single year 13 times. In 11 of those instances, or about 85% of the time, it scored fewer record-high closes the following year. The average for the years following more than 40 record-high closes, is 25. Still well above the overall average, but a sharp drop-off nonetheless. Additionally, from 1929 to 2020, the S&P 500 has posted an average yearly change of +7.4%. The average yearly change in the years following more than 40 record-high closes is +4.4%. Therefore, by these numbers, it may be a stretch to expect 2022 will deliver better results than what 2021 has offered. (Terence Gabriel/Lance Tupper) ***** FOR FRIDAY"S LIVE MARKETS" POSTS PRIOR TO 0900 EST/1400 GMT - CLICK HERE: read more