NEW YORK: Wall Street stocks began the week's trading on a muted note Monday with little forward momentum, though the S&P 500 was close to setting a new record.

US equities ended last week with solid gains after a mixed government employment report that undershot analysts' estimates for hiring in May, which gave traders hope the Federal Reserve will not end its easy money policies sooner than expected.

The S&P 500 gained strongly in Friday's session, and "it is somewhat understandable, then, that there is some hesitation in front of today's open, as market participants wait to see if a breakout move can happen," Patrick J. O'Hare of Briefing.com said.

About 30 minutes into trading, the benchmark Dow Jones Industrial Average was flat at 34,751.90, while the broad-based S&P 500 dipped 0.1 percent to 4,225.55.

The tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index also was down 0.1 percent at 13,802.76.

Among individual stocks, AMC Entertainment was up 22.5 percent as retail investors organized over social media platform Reddit continued to push up its price following the company completing a large new equity offering.

Amazon was down 0.1 percent after its founder Jeff Bezos said he would go into space next month on the first human flight launched by his Blue Origin rocket firm.