U.S. markets repeat aimless performance

NEW YORK, Jan. 22 (UPI) -- U.S. stock indexes turned in a repeat performance Wednesday with the Dow Jones industrial average down more than 40 points and the S&P 500 up slightly.

With numbers close to Tuesday's market movement, the Dow dropped 41.10 points Wednesday, off 0.25 percent to 16,373.34.

The Standard & Poor's 500 added 1.06 points, 0.06 percent, to reach 1,844.86. The technology-dominated Nasdaq composite index gained 17.24 points, 0.41 percent, to 4,243.

On the New York Stock Exchange, 2,015 stocks advanced and 1,097 declined on a volume of 3.3 billion shares.

That was marginally different from Tuesday when 2,037 issues advanced and 1,088 retreated.

Nineteen of 30 Dow components dropped, just one more than Tuesday, led by a 6.18 percent drop at IBM, which posted disappointing numbers in its fourth quarter report.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 index added 25 points, 0.16 percent, to 15,820.96.

In Europe, London's FTSE 100 lost 7.23 points, 0.12 percent, to 6,826.33.

The 10-year U.S. treasury was yielding 2.866 percent on a drop of 9/32.

The euro traded lower at $1.3544 and the dollar was higher against the yen at 104.53 yen.

Gold shed $5.50 to close at $1,236.30 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Silver lost 12 cents to settle at $19.75 an ounce.

Crude oil picked up $1.68 cents to close at $96.65 per barrel on the NYMEX.

On the Chicago Board of Trade, March corn was up 0.75 cents to $4.2575 per bushel. Soybeans was unchanged at $12.805 and winter wheat lost 1 cent to $5.6125.