Stocks Snap Back

Stocks recovered much of Monday’s big decline Tuesday on news of a $7.5 billion investment in Citigroup from Abu Dhabi.

The news helped investors forget about credit market troubles and a tumbling housing market for a day, and an upgrade of Intel helped boost the tech sector.

Investors also shook off comments from Federal Reserve officials that suggested the Fed isn’t likely to cut interest rates at its meeting next month. Fed chairman Ben Bernanke will speak on Thursday, and Dell will release its quarterly results after the close that day.

Intel gained 3% after JP Morgan said it expects solid results from the chip giant through mid-2008 on healthy PC demand and inventory levels, while AMD slipped on an American Technology Research downgrade.

eBay gained 5% on reports of strong holiday traffic and PayPal use. Amazon.com and VMware were other big gainers.

Sony was up 7% on reports of a an investment from a Dubai firm.

Activision surged 14% after raising guidance, and Tech Data was up 3.6% on its quarterly results.

Bidz.com plunged after lowering sales guidance.

The Nasdaq rose 40 to 2580, the S&P gained 21 to 1428, and the Dow surged 215 to 12,955. Volume rose to 4.32 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.23 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by a 22-10 margin on the NYSE, and 17-13 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 71% on the NYSE, and 79% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 26-384 on the NYSE, and 54-282 on the Nasdaq.