IBM, Cisco Gain as Stocks Slip

IBM (NYSE: IBM) and Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) edged higher on Tuesday as the rest of the market stalled on worries about swine flu and the health of the banking sector.

IBM tacked on 2% after raising its dividend, boosting its share buyback program and taking on Cisco in the networking switch market.

But despite the new competition, Cisco managed to notch a 1.6% gain on the day. The company will report its results on May 6. Juniper Networks (NASDAQ: JNPR) raised hopes for the networking sector last week when it said it sees conditions beginning to stabilize.

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) slipped 2.3% on a Wall Street Journal report that the software giant is considering taking on Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone.

Broadcom (NASDAQ: BRCM) fell 5% on a Charter Equity Research downgrade.

Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) slipped 1.6% despite posting strong quarterly results. Level 3 (NASDAQ: LVLT) fell 14% on its results to close at 97 cents a share.

eFuture (NASDAQ: EFUT) and Mindspeed (NASDAQ: MSPD) soared more than 35% each on their earnings reports.

After the close, Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) reported a 20% sales decline and said it reduced cash burn to just $18 million in what could be its final quarter before being acquired by Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL).

Wednesday morning will see the first reading of first-quarter GDP, expected to show a 4.7% decline, according to Briefing.com, and the Federal Reserve will conclude its latest interest rate policy meeting.

The Nasdaq lost 5 to 1673, the S&P 500 slipped 2 to 855, and the Dow lost 8 to 8016. Volume declined to 6.76 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.47 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by an 18-17 margin on the NYSE, and 15-11 on the Nasdaq. Downside volume was 58% on the NYSE, and 61% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 14-47 on the NYSE, and 18-22 on the Nasdaq.