YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: Stocks spent most of the session drifting along with modest gains before some late selling pressure caused the three major equity averages to retreat into the red for modest losses.

There weren't any real catalysts for trade this morning, but participants continued to provide support for stocks. Their bid was primarily underpinned by a fear of missing out on further gains, especially after the stock market showed its resilience with last week's rebound, which came in the wake of volatility earlier this month.

The lack of leadership eventually caught up with stocks in the final few minutes of trade, when waning support fueled selling interest. The effort left nine of the 10 major sectors to log losses after nine of them had sported gains in the early going.

Telecom was the only major sector that held on to its gain. As a group, telecom stocks settled with a 1.4% gain. Global communication handset maker Nokia (NOK 8.74, +0.39) put on a strong performance with help from an upgrade by analysts at Goldman Sachs.

GSI Commerce (GSIC 29.20, +9.82) surged after eBay (EBAY 30.34, -1.36) bid to take over the company for $29.25 per share, a a premium of about 50% over the stock's closing price from this past Friday.

Consumer discretionary plays were collectively the worst performing stocks. They fell 1.1% as Marriott (MAR 35.30, -2.36) dropped to a multi-month low in response to a downgrade by analysts at Goldman Sachs.

Data had little impact on trade today. Personal income for February failed to surprise with a 0.3% increase, which is exactly what had been expected, on average, among economists polled by Briefing.com. Spending increased by 0.7%, which is greater than the 0.5% increase that had been broadly expected.

Pending home sales posted a strong 2.1% increase for February. A 0.3% increase is all that had been expected, on average, among a sample of economists surveyed by Briefing.com.

Not even data could bring in traders from the sidelines. That kept participation at depressed levels, such that overall trade volume on the NYSE failed to break 800 million shares.

Treasuries saw some minor swings this session. Some of the action was driven by the moves of the stock market, but cues were also taken from a $35 billion auction of 2-year Notes. The auction was highlighted by a yield of 0.789%, a bid-to-cover of 3.16 for dollar demand of $110.6 billion, and an indirect bidder participation rate of 33%. Treasuries initially pulled back in response to the results, but were able to regroup.

Commodities finished lower across the board today, led by declines in grains (-1.5%), and industrials (-1.3%).

May crude oil sold off 1.4% to close at $103.98 per barrel. Prices dropped close to a point in the last 30 minutes of pit trade to end near session lows. April natural gas ended down 1.1% to $4.36 per MMBtu. After failing to break a trend line, around the $4.54 area with minutes to go in the session, price sold off sharply (around 14 cents) to lows.

April gold ended down 0.4% to $1419.90 per ounce, while May silver gained 0.1% to close at $37.09 per ounce. Both metals spent most of the session bouncing off of their respective lows and were aided by a pullback in the dollar index.

Advancing Sectors: Telecom (+1.4%)
Unchanged: Consumer Staples, Health Care, Industrial
Declining Sectors: Energy (-0.1%), Utilities (-0.3%), Financial (-0.3%), Materials (-0.5%), Tech (-0.6%), Consumer Discretionary (-1.1%)DJ30 -22.71 NASDAQ -12.38 NQ100 -0.6% R2K -0.3% SP400 -0.4% SP500 -3.61 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1089/1.67 bln/1509 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1214/783 mln/1765