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Cautious at the open

10/01/2005 16:51
Stocks were mixed at the open Monday, as investors eyed rising oil prices and a spate of deal news, but showed caution after last week's big selloff.

The Dow Jones industrial average (down 18.92 to 10,603.96, Charts), the Standard & Poor's 500 (down 1.01 to 1,185.18, Charts) index and the Nasdaq composite (down 1.15 to 2,087.46, Charts) all hovered near unchanged around 10 minutes into the new session.

Stock had started off the new year on a sour note, tumbling in the first week of 2005, as investors cashed out on some of the big winners in the market rally in late 2004.

Some of that hesitation remained in place early Monday.

In corporate news, Alltel, a rural telephone company, said it would buy Western Wireless for about $4.4 billion in cash and stock, confirming speculation about a merger. Alltel (unchanged at $56.12, Research) shares slid around 3 percent in the early going, while Western Wireless (up $0.84 to $37.36, Research) gained around two percent.

In other news, News Corp. (unchanged at $18.23, Research) said it would buy out the remaining stake of Fox Entertainment Group it doesn't already own, in a deal worth around $6 billion. Fox (unchanged at $31.22, Research) shares popped on the news.

Wholesale inventories, the day's one economic report of interest, is due shortly. Inventories likely rose 0.7 percent in November, according to Briefing.com estimates, after rising 1.1 percent in October.

A spike in oil was among the factors keeping a lid on market movement in the early going. U.S. light crude oil for February delivery rose 87 cents to $46.30 a barrel in electronic trading.

Treasury prices inched higher, pushing the yield on the 10-year note down to 4.26 percent, from 4.27 percent late Friday. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions.

In currency trading, the dollar fell versus the euro and yen.

COMEX gold rose 90 cents to $420.40 an ounce.

In global trade, Asian-Pacific stocks ended mixed Monday, and European shares were mixed at midday.