NEW YORK ? Wall Street ended with modest gains Wednesday after a surprisingly weak report on US new home sales dampened optimism from strong earnings news and data showing gains in US income and spending.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.51 points (0.01 percent) to 10,466.44 at the closing bell, managing to hold positive for a fourth day of gains.
The technology-rich Nasdaq composite climbed 16.97 points (0.75 percent) to 2,269.64 while the broad-market Standard & Poor's 500 index added 2.57 points (0.23 percent) to 1,120.59.
Some early gains faded after a government report showed sales of new US homes slid 11.3 percent in November to their lowest level since April.
Michael Zoller at Moody's Economy.com said the surprisingly weak report negates several months of gains. But he said the figures may have been skewed by a government tax credit set to expire in November before Congress extended and expanded it.
"Those who were considering contracting a new home in November would have been unable to meet the November 30 deadline in order to claim the tax credit," he said.
"Though the tax credit was extended and expanded, November buyers had no way of knowing in advance that their sales would qualify. This month may therefore be an anomaly, and an increase in new home sales in December would not be shocking."
The market also reacted to better-than-expected profit news from American Greetings, following positive surprises late Tuesday from tech firms Red Hat and Micron Technology.
"While the broader market endured a roller-coaster day, technology stocks emerged as the stars of the session," said Elizabeth Harrow of Schaeffer's Investment Research.
Investors also digested news that US consumer spending, a key growth driver, rose 0.5 percent in November, while personal incomes grew 0.4 percent.
"The report wasn't all that one would hope it would be, yet it fits in the context of being consistent with an ongoing recovery in economic activity from the depths of the fourth quarter in 2008 and the first quarter in 2009," said Patrick O'Hare at Briefing.com.
Among stocks in focus, Micron Technology leapt 6.16 percent to $9.99 after a better-than-expected earnings report from the semiconductor firm while rival SanDisk climbed 3.02 percent to $28.27.
Computer services firm Red Hat rallied 5.22 percent to $31.43 after its profit report.
Research in Motion managed to register a 0.60 percent gain to $67.62 as the Canadian firm acknowledged a new network outage for its popular BlackBerry smartphone in the Americas, the second in less than a week for some customers.
American Greeting fell 0.13 percent to $23.81 even after the greeting card maker said it swung to profit in the most recent quarter.
Bonds were mixed. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury bond rose to 3.748 percent from 3.744 percent Tuesday and that on the 30-year bond dipped to 4.603 percent from 4.605 percent. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.
