The markets traded flat during the midday with the Dow adding 7 points to 13,279 ahead of the release of minutes on Wednesday from the Federal Reserve meeting last month. Nasdaq rose 4 points to 3080. On the upside
Capital One upgraded Rex Energy (Nasdaq: REXX) to a Strong Buy rating. Rising crude oil prices lifted shares of Alpha Natural Resources (NYSE: ANR) . Nordson (NYSE: NDSN) reported higher third quarter earnings that beat expectations as revenue climbed and the company forecast current quarter results ahead of estimates. On the downside Tech Data (Nasdaq: TECD) disappointed with lower second quarter earnings that fell short of analyst expectations.Youku.com (NYSE: YOKU) and Tudou Holdings (Nasdaq: TUDO) shareholders approved merging the two companies which will increase weekly users to surpass Baidu's (Nasdaq: BIDU) weekly users. Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) narrowed first quarter losses but investors were disappointed with flat revenue from the bookseller's Nook business. In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of more than 2 to 1 on both the NYSE and on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks gained 6 points to 822.