SAP Helps Tech Stocks Limit Losses

Upbeat comments from SAP (NYSE: SAP) helped limit tech sector losses on a day that saw blue chip shares fall sharply.

The Nasdaq lost 0.5%, but finished 1.5% off its lows for the day after Reuters reported that SAP sees “glimmers of hope” for the economy.

The news was good for modest gains in SAP and rival Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL), and a host of big-cap tech stocks fared even better. Symantec (NASDAQ: SYMC), Adobe (NASDAQ: ADBE), Novell (NASDAQ: NOVL), Dell (NASDAQ: DELL), AMD (NYSE: AMD) and Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO) gained 2% or more on the day.

AMD benefited from Intel’s antitrust woes.

Applied Materials (NASDAQ: AMAT) slipped 1% a day ahead of its quarterly results, while Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) was fractionally lower on news of its first bond offering.

Pansoft (NASDAQ: PSOF) soared 131% after signing a deal with Microsoft China.

Dish Network (NASDAQ: DISH) shot up 17% after beating earnings estimates.

Nokia (NYSE: NOK) lost 3% on a Global Crown Capital downgrade.

The broader market fell after investors sold financial stocks after the firms began to raise money to meet government “stress test” mandates. Also weighing on stocks were reports that the government might not have been as tough on banks as it could have been.

The Nasdaq slipped 7 to 1731, the S&P 500 fell 20 to 909, and the Dow lost 155 to 8418. Volume declined to 6.15 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.56 billion on the Nasdaq. Decliners led by a 26-10 margin on the NYSE, and 16-11 on the Nasdaq. Downside volume was 83% on the NYSE, and 51% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 21-51 on the NYSE, and 29-16 on the Nasdaq.