3:00 pm : Action this afternoon remains subdued as the three major indices continue to move sideways. The horizontal chop has lasted for several hours straight.

Amid the mixed action of the broader market, Treasuries have had a rather quiet session. In turn, the benchmark 10-year Note is up only four ticks so that its yield remains above 3.8%. DJ30 -32.58 NASDAQ +11.73 SP500 -1.46 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1436/1.65 bln/1211 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1541/672 mln/1456

2:30 pm : The major indices continue to move sideways in range-bound trade. The lack of vertical movement has made for a rather quiet afternoon.

Still, many participants are eager to see whether the stock market can find some late support, as it did in recent sessions, to propel it to a fifth straight gain. The current streak of gains has stocks up more than 2% for the week. DJ30 -28.50 NASDAQ +11.95 SP500 -1.06 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1456/1.55 bln/1172 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1541/633 mln/1443

2:00 pm : The S&P 500 recently poked into positive territory, but its stay there was short lived. It is now back to trading with a fractional loss.

Meanwhile, the Nasdaq has made its way to a nice gain. Large-cap tech plays Microsoft (MSFT 30.78, +0.33), Google (GOOG 601.71, +7.61), and Oracle (ORCL 24.65, +0.27) continue to provide leadership to the bunch after they had lagged in the past couple of sessions. Those underperformances followed a strong year for tech stocks; tech finished 2009 with a 60% gain, the best of any sector. DJ30 -31.44 NASDAQ +11.66 SP500 -1.59 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1468/1.43 bln/1149 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1554/588 mln/1433