The KBW Bank Index spent most of Tuesday in negative territory because of a weak report on consumer confidence but rose in the last hour of trading to close up 0.1%.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 0.13%, and the Standard & Poor's 500 index was off 0.26%.
Stocks rose briefly in the morning after the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price index showed that home prices in major metropolitan markets rose 0.5% in May, from the previous month.
But stocks fell after the Conference Board said that its July Consumer Confidence Index fell 2.7 points from June, to 46.6. Economists on average had expected the number to be 49.
Decliners included JPMorgan Chase & Co., off 0.1%; U.S. Bancorp, 0.6%; SunTrust Banks Inc., 3.4%; M&T Bank Corp., 1.9%, and Marshall & Ilsley Corp., 0.9%.
Gainers included Bank of America Corp., up 1.9%; Wells Fargo & Co., 1.2%; PNC Financial Services Group Inc., 4.5%; BB&T Corp., 0.8%; Comerica Inc., 0.5%, and Citigroup Inc., 28 cents a share, to $2.97.
