TECH STOCKS: Yahoo, Pandora Rise In Broad Tech Gains

By Rex Crum, MarketWatch

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Tech stocks put in a mostly upbeat trading performance Tuesday, with Yahoo Inc. and Pandora Media Inc. among the advancers, but Oracle Corp. declining even after it announced new partnerships with Microsoft Corp. and Salesforce.com Inc.

Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) shares rose 3.7%, to close at $24.95 after the company held its annual shareholders meeting. Chief Executive Marissa Mayer used the meeting to tout Yahoo's gains in its mobile business due to revamped apps for email and sharing photos.

Pandora's (P) shares rose more 8.5% to close at $16.41 after the online radio company said its service is now available in more than 100 automobile models and now has more than 2.5 million listeners using its service in cars. The number of car models offering Pandora has doubled from the same period a year ago.

Advances also came from Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), Seagate Technology (STX), Intel Corp. (INTC) and eBay Inc. (EBAY).

The Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) rose 27 points to 3,347, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) ended the day with a gain of 2.7%

Oracle (ORCL) shed 21 cents a share to close at $29.96 after the company unveiled a new partnership with Salesforce (CRM) in which the companies will work together to improve their capabilities in cloud computing under a nine-year deal.

The deal with Salesforce came after Oracle said late Monday it reached a new partnership with Microsoft (MSFT) that will let Oracle's software run on Microsoft's enterprise platforms, including the Windows Azure cloud infrastructure.

Salesforce shares rose 1.3%, to $37.44 but Microsoft ended the day down by 5 cents a share at $33.67.

Microsoft was also getting attention a day ahead of its Build conference, in which the software giant will give developers more of a look at the Windows 8.1 operating system upgrade, which has been code-named Windows Blue.

Apple Inc. (AAPL) managed to rise by 9 cents a share and close at $402.63. Before the market opened, Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Ittai Kidron cut his price target on Apple's stock to $460 a share from $480 and lowered his iPhone sales estimates from the June quarter by 1 million units.

Netflix Inc. (NFLX) shares were trimmed by 1.3% to close at $212.90 after Bernstein Research analyst Carlos Kirjner cut his rating on Netflix to underperform from market perform, but raised his price target on the stock to $180 a share from $125. In a research note, Kirjner said Netflix's current stock price reflects "unrealistic" expectations across its business areas.

Demand Media Inc. (DMD) shares fell more than 20%, to close at $6.50 after the website operator cut its second-quarter revenue forecast due to a reduction in referral traffic from search engines such as Google. Analysts as JMP Securities and Stifel Nicolaus also cut their ratings on Demand Media's stock.

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