The third quarter has been an upbeat one for stocks, with the S&P 500 overcoming earlier July weakness to put up three straight weeks of gains, including three record highs along the way.

Plenty of headline events remain this quarter, of course, from big retailers' quarterly results to any hints about interest rates from the Federal Reserve at the Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium.

But strategists expect Wall Street to remain resilient, as it has in the face of a war in the Middle East that has driven up oil prices.

The fact that stocks are once again bumping up against highs shows that "investors don't spook easily and will bid up stocks on any incrementally neutral (let alone positive) news," writes DataTrek co-founder Nicholas Colas. "We expect this to hold through the second half of the quarter, barring a truly exogenous shock."

But Colas notes that oil prices, in the end, will be a key to future stock moves.

"Oil prices are the fulcrum issue in both fixed income and equity capital markets," Colas wrote Monday. "Barring a lasting Mideast cease-fire and peace negotiations, we expect oil prices to continue being the key driver of both yields and stock prices. Recent history is very clear on this point, and we do not see a break from this regime without a definitive end to hostilities."

Oil headlines may be more meaningful since we'll be getting much less news from the central bank: He notes that with the Fed committed to being less communicative, the market is likely baking in higher interest rates absent a decline in oil, but that hasn't been slowing the market down.

Earnings have been a major part of that rally. Although the second-quarter reporting season isn't over, so far it's been better than expected, so much so that S&P 500 companies may record their best quarterly gains in nearly half a decade-and that's after double-digit earnings per share growth in the first quarter.

All told, S&P 500 EPS growth is tracking a gain of 31% from last year, notes Goldman Sachs.

"Earnings are the strong side: rising capital-goods demand is lifting S&P 500 sales, and units plus pricing power are lifting margins, led by Tech-related sectors," writes Stifel Equity Strategist Thomas Carroll, who was out with his own mid-quarter roundup on Monday. In other words, "explosive profit growth...lifts all stocks."

Nonetheless, he is more cautious than most, warning that with financial conditions unlikely to ease from here, stock valuations will likely feel the pinch, even as EPS accelerates.

Yet others are more optimistic. Citi Strategist Scott Chronert reiterated his belief on Monday that the S&P 500 can reach 8100 by the end of the year. Late last week he boosted his full year S&P 500 index EPS estimate to $365 from $350, citing the strong second quarter as well as the broad-based nature of earnings growth and stock gains beyond just tech.

He does note that earnings growth comes with the caveat that "asset writeups for certain megacaps have provided a significant boost to consensus earnings but cannot be directly attributed to operating performance." In other words, investors can't extrapolate to the back half of the year the entirety of the robust second quarter, and it will create tough comparisons next year.

For now however, he thinks that gains by both tech and non-tech will keep the index chugging ahead.

Like Chronert, Colas is more upbeat, citing factors like the artificial intelligence boom (in terms of spending by big tech players and the productivity benefits across sectors that adopt these tools) and the "remarkable resilience of the US economy, which has been able to withstand a trade policy shock and an oil price shock in less than one year without tipping into recession...We remain resolutely bullish on global/U.S. stocks."

No summer doldrums here.