A rise in oil prices after BP shut down an Alaskan pipeline weighed down the markets during the midday with the Dow losing 47 points to 11,627. Nasdaq slipped 5 points to 2697.
On the upside
Acadia Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ACAD) announced a private placement with institutional investors to raise $15 million.
A report said that 2011 will be a "transformative year" for Aastrom Biosciences (Nasdaq: ASTM).
Auxilium (Nasdaq: AUXL) reported preliminary fourth quarter results that rose to top analyst expectations.
On the downside
Acuity Brands (NYSE: AYI) reported higher first quarter earnings but the results fell short of expectations.
Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) announced that the Servers and Tools Business leader Bob Muglia will depart from the firm in summer 2011.
Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK) will pay approximately $13.7 billion in stock to acquire Progress Energy.
In the broad market, declining issues outpaced advancers by a margin of more than 3 to 2 on the NYSE and by 7 to 5 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks eased a point to 786.