The markets turned negative during the midday with the Dow slipping 17 points to 15,900 in anticipation of the Federal Reserve beginning to taper its bond buying program. Nasdaq lost 2 points to 4026.
On the upside
Raymond James upgraded iRobot (Nasdaq: IRBT) from a Market Perform rating to a Strong Buy rating.
Methes Energies International (Nasdaq: MEIL) reported record production in November.
European Medicines Agency included a review of Ariad's (Nasdaq: ARIA) leukemia treatment Iclusig on its December meeting agenda.
On the downside
CombiMatrix (Nasdaq: CBMX) priced its offering of 12,000 units of convertible preferred stock and warrants.
AGCO (NYSE: AGCO) will repurchase up to $500 million worth of company stock but the stock price fell.
Shares of Opko Health (NYSE: OPK) extended its losses.
In the broad market, declining issues outpaced advancers by a margin of 7 to 5 on both the NYSE and on Nasdaq. The broader S&P 500 lost 4 points to 1781. Bitcoin dropped $47.89 or 6.09% to $738.67.
