YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: Stocks were able to overcome a weak start, but their advance ran into resistance and rolled over late in the session. However, the slide was stopped short as support was secured at the lows set last week.

Premarket selling pressure made for a lower start to the session as participants showed a moderately negative reaction to steep losses in Asia, where China's regulators followed through with plans to raise reserve requirements at select banks and Japan's sovereign debt was put on a negative outlook from Standard & Poor's. A subsequent flight to quality boosted the buck, which didn't help the early tone of trade either.

However, stocks were able to garner some midmorning support with the release of the latest Consumer Confidence Index, which climbed to 55.9 in January from 53.6 in December. Not only did the January reading exceed the 53.5 that had been widely expected, but it also marked the highest reading in more than one year.

Though there is no empirical evidence that connects consumer confidence with higher spending and, in turn, higher profits for retailers, retailers steadily outperformed the broader market and finished with a 0.6% gain.

Tech emerged to trade with considerable strength for most of the session, thanks to Apple (AAPL 205.94, +2.87), which posted upside earnings and a strong forecast. Support for the stock had been constrained initially as it was learned that accounting changes played a part in Apple's numbers, but the stock was able to brush that aside.

Apple's leadership helped take the Nasdaq Composite and the Nasdaq 100 markedly higher, but the two averages ran into resistance at their 50-day moving averages, which were violated during last week's retreats. Meanwhile, the broad-based S&P 500 struggled to make much of a move past the psychologically-significant 1100 line. Failure to extend gains inevitably gave way to selling.

The late afternoon slide took tech back to the neutral line after it had been up as much as 1.3%. Texas Instruments (TXN 23.35, -0.34) was among the sector's primary laggards; participants sold news of the company's positive earnings surprise after the shares had spiked 2.5% in the session before the announcement.

Dow components Johnson & Johnson (JNJ 62.79, -0.43) and Verizon (VZ 30.17, -0.51) were also sold despite better-than-expected earnings of their own.

Fellow Dow component Travelers (TRV 50.23, +1.34) managed to garner support amid its upside surprise, but it couldn't keep the financial sector from falling in afternoon action. Weakness among specialized finance companies (-4.4%) dragged the sector to a 1.7% loss after it had been up as much as 1.0%.

Advancing Sectors: Utilities (+0.4%), Consumer Discretionary (+0.1%)
Declining Sectors: Financial (-1.7%), Telecom (-1.2%), Materials (-1.1%), Energy (-0.5%), Health Care (-0.4%), Industrials (-0.1%)
Unchanged: Consumer Staples, TechDJ30 -2.57 NASDAQ -7.07 NQ100 +0.1% R2K -1.0% SP400 -0.4% SP500 -4.61 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 869/2.39 bln/1797 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1092/1.12 bln/1943