Thursday Sector Leaders: Energy, Materials

In afternoon trading on Thursday, Energy stocks are the best performing sector, up 2.5%. Within that group, Chesapeake Energy  (NYSE: CHK) and QEP Resources (NYSE: QEP) are two of the day's stand-outs, showing a gain of 16.3% and 8.1%, respectively. Among energy ETFs, one ETF following the sector is the Energy Select Sector SPDR ETF (AMEX: XLE), which is up 1.6% on the day, and down 6.01% year-to-date. Chesapeake Energy, meanwhile, is down 18.21% year-to-date, and QEP Resources, is down 22.81% ...