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Wall Street takes a break
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November 24, 1998: 10:08 a.m. ET
Stocks linger around unchanged as market recoups after record run
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - A day after the Dow industrials soared to a record close, investors opted for a pause in early trading, keeping the stock market near unchanged levels and paying little attention to the day's economic data.
At around 10 a.m. the Dow Jones industrial average was 10.55 points lower at 9,363.72. On the New York Stock Exchange, trading volume reached 77 million shares with advances edging ahead of declines 1,159 to 1,094.
The Nasdaq Composite inched up 1.77 to 1,979.19 and the S&P 500 index traded up 0.28 to 1,188.49.
The bond market was narrowly mixed, with the benchmark 30-year Treasury bond rising 1/4 of a point in price for a yield of 5.23 percent.
The dollar maintained strength against the German mark, but traded modestly lower against the Japanese yen.
The cooling of the merged
In the stock market, exhausted after Monday's torrid rally, investors took time to take profits and readjust their positions before taking time off for the Thanksgiving holiday later in the week.
News of the merger of Netscape (NSCP) and America Online (AOL), now confirmed, once again topped most trading agendas. After rising sharply Monday, shares of Netscape fell 1-7/16 to 40-1/2. AOL, however, gained 2-1/2 to 91-3/4 and Sun Microsystems (SUNW), also involved in the deal, advanced 2-5/16 to 73-5/8.
In the day's other significant deal, shares of retailer JCPenney (JCP) eased 7/16 to 54-1/2 after the company announced it was buying drug store chain Genovese (GDX.A) in a $492 million deal. Genovese shares fell 5/8 to 29-3/8.
Finally, the stock of Heller Financial (HF) gained 1-3/4 to 28-1/2 following news the company is cutting 15 percent of its workforce and taking a fourth-quarter charge whose size is yet to be determined. 
-- by staff writer Malina Poshtova Zang
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