Wall Street was higher in midday trade on Wednesday after an up-and-down morning on nerves from Tuesday’s declines and news that existing home sales were down by 3.8 percent in June.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was 0.38 percent higher at mid-session to 13,769.71 after gaining as much as 100 points at one point and losing up to 30 points at another in morning trade.
The Nasdaq Composite was 2,647.27, up 0.28 percent, while the S&P 500 had added 0.36 percent to 1,516.51.
There were notable gains, however.
Pharmaceutical group Merck (NYSE: MRK) added $1.61 to $53.33 after it said it would buy NovaCardia (NAS: NCAR), a clinical-stage pharmaceutical firm that specializes in cardiovascular disease.
In the aerospace sector, Boeing (NYSE: BA; TYO: 7661) gained $3.56 to $107.36 after it reported that it earned $1.35 per share in the second quarter, higher than the earnings of $1.16 per share that had been anticipated.
The internet sector was mixed after Amazon.com (NAS: AMZN) said that its earnings in the second quarter were 19 cents per share, up from 5 cents per share in the same quarter last year.
The report brought upgrades - from “neutral to “outperform” from Credit Suisse (NYSE: CS; SWX: CSGN) and from “accumulate” to “buy” from ThinkEquity, which also raised Amazon’s target share price from $80 to $105.
Amazon was up $17.75 to $87 in early afternoon trade.
Other gainers in the sector included Yahoo (NAS: YHOO), which gained 9 cents to $24.93 and eBay (NAS: EBAY), which was 56 cents higher to $33.62.
Google (NAS: GOOG; LSE: GGEA), however, dropped $3.99 to $510.01.