Better than expected earnings from IBMand a strong manufacturing report saved the market from a sell-off on Thursday.
IBM surged 5% after beating estimates, offsetting lukewarm reports from Intel, Yahoo, Appleand QLogic.
Rumors that Osama bin Laden could be captured also boosted the market in a volatile session ahead of options expiration.
The Nasdaq lost 2 to 2109, the S&P 500 climbed 1 to 1132, and the Dow rose 15 to 10,553. Volume rose to 1.7 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.23 billion on the Nasdaq. Decliners led by a few issues on the NYSE, while advancers led 16-15 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 52% on the NYSE, and 49% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 439-3 on the NYSE, and 330-5 on the Nasdaq.
After the close, Juniper, Sun, Rambus, Transmeta, Creeand Visual Networksbeat estimates, while Lionbridgemissed. Texas Instrumentsannounced a new CEO.
During the day, Teradyneand Extreme Networksclimbed on better than expected results.
AsiaInfogained 8% on a contract win.
HProse 2.4% on strong Linux sales.
And Dellfell on news that HP is back on top in global PC sales.
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