TECH STOCKS: Apple Gains Help Tech Sector Rise

By Rex Crum, MarketWatch Piper Jaffray raises price target as iPhone 6 supplies improve

NEW YORK (MarketWatch)--Tech stocks shook off early doldrums Thursday, with Apple Inc. among the sector leaders gaining ground after Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster raised his price target on the iPhone maker.

Apple (AAPL) shares rose 1.5% to $116.36 after Munster lifted his price target on the company to $135 a share from $120. Munster cited improvements in Apple's ability to match supplies of the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6+ with consumer demands fas the main reason for raising his expectations for Apple's stock price to rise.

Among other leading tech stocks, gains came from Yahoo Inc. (YHOO), Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Facebook Inc. (FB).

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) shares rose 16 cents to $48.36, even as analysts at Morgan Stanley said Thursday that investors might want to wait for the shares to fall further before investing in the software giant.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) rose 19 points to 4,695 and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) was also in positive territory.

While the broader tech sector advanced, there emerged some notable decliners.

GoPro Inc. (GPRO) fell more than 6% to $74.11 a share. Late Wednesday, the digital sport-camera maker said it would offer more than 10 million shares in a secondary stock offering at $75 a share.

Salesforce.com Inc. (CRM) game up more than 3% to trade at $59.02 a share after the on-demand software company gave a disappointing fourth-quarter forecast on Wednesday. Salesforce said it expects to report a fourth-quarter profit, excluding one-time items, of 13 cents to 14 cents a share on revenue of about $1.44 billion. Analysts surveyed by FactSet estimate fourth-quarter earnings of 15 cents a share on revenue of $1.45 billion for the period ending in January.

Losses also came from Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), Google Inc. (GOOGL) and Pandora Media Inc. (P).

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