Bargain hunters lifted the markets to a sharply higher open with the Dow climbing 150 points to 9837 after the holiday weekend. Nasdaq soared 41 points to 2133.
On the upside
Patterson-UTI Energy (Nasdaq: PTEN) will pay approximately $237.7 million in cash to acquire the pressure pumping and wireline businesses of Key Energy Services (NYSE: KEG).
Broadwind Energy's (Nasdaq: BWEN) subsidiary Tower Tech was selected by Gamesa Technology to supply structural wind towers for wind projects around the country.
JA Solar (Nasdaq: JASO) signed a multi-year contract to provide MEMC Electronic Materials (NYSE: WFR) with high performance solar modules.
On the downside
SonicWALL (Nasdaq: SNWL) announced that an unnamed third party that made an unsolicited bid for the company has withdrawn its offer.
JP Morgan analyst Christopher Danely downgraded RF Micro Devices (Nasdaq: RFMD) saying that handset demand is weakening.
Concerns that the Chinese economy will slow weighed down shares of online Chinese travel services firm Ctrip.com (Nasdaq: CTRP).
In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 6 to 1 on the NYSE and by more than 4 to 1 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks leaped 13 points to 612.
