Stocks mixed after record

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Stocks flattened out Friday afternoon, giving back the day's gains as investors got a little skittish after pushing the Dow to an all-time intraday high and the Nasdaq and S&P 500 to multi-year highs.

The Dow Jones industrial average (down 7.24 to 13,234.14, Charts) was little changed more than 3 hours into the session, briefly touching a new intraday high of 13,283.31 before retreating. The blue-chip leader ended the previous session at a record high for the sixth time in seven sessions.

The broader S&P 500 (up 0.43 to 1,502.82, Charts) index was little changed after ending the previous session above 1,500 for the first time since the third quarter of 2000. The S&P 500 is not far from its all-time high of 1527.46 hit on March 2000 at the tail end of the 1990's tech boom-fueled bull run.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite (down 1.87 to 2,563.59, Charts) was also little changed after ending the previous session at a 6-year high.

Stocks rose in the morning, extending the recent rally as investors welcomed the April jobs report, lower oil prices and talk of a Microsoft-Yahoo merger. But after pushing the major gauges to the new highs, investors backed off a bit.

The Dow has now risen in 22 of the last 25 sessions, marking its longest bull run since the spring of 1944, when the indicator ended higher in 23 of 26 sessions, according to Dow Jones.

The run has reflected stronger than expected first-quarter earnings, the spate of mergers and other deals news and economic news that suggests that growth is slowing at a moderate pace and that inflation is moderating.

"It's pretty much playing out according to the plan that [Fed Chairman] Bernanke laid out for a soft landing," said Douglas Roberts, managing principal at Channel Capital Research.

The jobs report Friday seemed to support the so-called soft landing scenario, Roberts added.

Employers added 88,000 jobs in April, the smallest monthly number in over two years, and short of forecasts for 100,000 jobs added. Employers added an upwardly revised 177,000 jobs in March.

The unemployment rate, generated by a separate survey, rose to 4.5 percent from 4.4 percent, as expected.

Average hourly earnings, the report's inflation component, rose a smaller-than-expected 0.2 percent after rising 0.3 percent in March.

Taken as a whole the report seemed to suggest growth is slowing enough to take the edge off inflationary pressures, but not so much as to drive the economy into a recession, all of which raised bets that the Federal Reserve might cut interest rates later this year.

Fed policy makers are meeting next week and are expected to hold rates steady at 5.25 percent for the 7th meeting in a row.

In corporate news, Microsoft (down $0.57 to $30.40, Charts, Fortune 500) is considering entering formal merger negotiations with Yahoo (up $4.50 to $32.68, Charts, Fortune 500), according to published reports. Yahoo shares surged 18 percent, while Microsoft shares slipped 1.5 percent.

In addition, Reuters (up $14.58 to $73.50, Charts) group confirmed it has received a takeover offer from a third party.

Interactive Brokers Group (Charts) gained 8 percent in its first day as a publicly-traded company, one day after the options-trading firm raised $1.2 billion with an initial public offering.

On the downside, QLogic (down $1.38 to $16.44, Charts) reported weaker fourth-quarter profit that missed estimates and warned that first-quarter earnings and revenue won't meet estimates. Shares of the supplier of gear for computer data storage networks slipped 8 percent Friday.

Market breadth was positive. On the New York Stock Exchange, winners topped losers by a narrow margin on volume of 790 million shares. On the Nasdaq, advancers barely topped decliners on volume of 1.29 billion shares.

Treasury prices rose on bets that the Fed is bound to cut rates sooner than raise them, lowering the yield on the 10-year note to about 4.64 percent from 4.67 percent late Thursday. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.

In currency trading, the dollar fell against the euro and the yen.

U.S. light crude oil for June delivery fell 67 cents to $62.52 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

COMEX gold for June delivery rose $6.60 to $691 an ounce.