TECH STOCKS: JDSU, Pandora Buck Tech's Weak Performance

By Rex Crum, MarketWatch

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Gains from JDS Uniphase and Pandora Media Inc. stood out among tech stocks Thursday as most of the sector struggled to find any upward momentum.

JDSU (JDSUD) climbed more than 10% to $13.36 a share a day after the networking company said Wednesday that it will split into two separate publicly traded companies. One company will focus on JDSU's core networking hardware business, while the other will take over software-defined networking technologies. The split is scheduled to be completed by the third quarter of 2015.

Following the announcement, RBC analyst Mark Sue raised his rating on JDSU to outperform, or buy, from sector perform, and lifted his price target on the company's stock to $18 a share from $11. Sue called JDSU's move "a significant new start for an industry defined by high innovation."

Pandora (P) rose as much as 5%, to $27.47 a share after the online radio company said it reached a new U.S. licensing deal with music-rights manager BMG. The agreement covers all of the BMI and ASCAP music catalogs that are managed under BMG.

Most other leading tech stocks were in the red. Declines came from Oracle Corp. (ORCL), Netflix Inc. (NFLX), Google Inc. (GOOGL) and LinkedIn Corp. (LNKD).

Apple Inc. (AAPL) was off by 1% at $99.88 a share as investors and analysts continued to assess the implications of the company's new iPhones, Apple Watch and Apple Pay mobile-payment technology.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) shed 24 points to fall to 4,563 and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index was off by 0.6%.

(Read more about the day's market action in Movers & Shakers http://www.marketwatch.com/storyno-meta-for-guid.)

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