eBay, Juniper Jump as Palm Slumps

eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY), Juniper (NASDAQ: JNPR) and SanDisk (NASDAQ: SNDK) were some of the tech sector’s big gainers on Wednesday, but Palm (NASDAQ: PALM) shares took a beating on a downgrade.

Palm lost 9 percent after a Credit Suisse analyst said the company’s exclusive Pixi deal with Sprint (NYSE: S) could limit sales.

Research in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM) and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) also lost ground, even though Apple surprised with an appearance by Steve Jobs.

But eBay, SanDisk and Juniper led the rest of the Nasdaq to a 1.1 percent gain despite a mixed Federal Reserve reading on the economy that renewed concerns about consumer spending. eBay and SanDisk benefited from analyst upgrades, while Juniper rose 7.6 percent on upbeat company comments at a Citi technology conference.

Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) was up 3 percent a week ahead of its quarterly earnings report.

Hutchinson (NASDAQ: HTCH) continued to gain a day after raising its financial guidance, surging 17 percent.

Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN) was a late winner, rising in after-hours trading after the company raised its earnings and sales guidance.

The Nasdaq rose 22 to 2060, the S&P 500 was up 8 to 1033, and the Dow gained 49 to 9547. Volume declined to 5.2 billion shares on the NYSE, but rose to 2.5 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by a 26-10 margin on the NYSE, and 19-8 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 66 percent on the NYSE, and 77 percent on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 214-56 on the NYSE, and 98-6 on the Nasdaq.