Stocks Fail to Find Footing

Among earnings reports, Humana (HUM Quote) said it had a fourth-quarter profit of $155 million, or 92 cents a share, more than doubling from the year-ago quarter. The health insurance group beat the Thomson First Call average estimate by 4 cents, and its shares rose 52 cents, or 0.9%, to $57.84.

Chipmaker KLA-Tencor (KLAC Quote) traded higher after reporting fiscal second-quarter earnings of $90 million, or 44 cents a share, a rise of nearly 16% from a year ago. Revenue jumped to $649.3 million from $487.7 million. While both results and revenue missed Wall Street's targets, the stock finished higher by $1.29, or 2.6%, to $51.29.

Commodities pulled back from intraday highs. Oil futures relinquished early gains and finished down 28 cents at $58.74 a barrel, while natural gas gained 16 cents at $7.63 per million British thermal units. Gold climbed $4.60 to $656.10 an ounce, and silver ended up 18 cents to $13.55 an ounce.

In the day's only economic release, the Institute for Supply Management said its services index rose to a reading of 59.0 last month from 56.7 in December. Economists expected the index to rise to 57.0.

"Sales were very strong in November and December as a result of the plunge in gas prices, which gave consumers a huge cash windfall just before the holidays," said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist with High Frequency Economics. "They spent most of the money, and that's why the ISM nonmanufacturing index is so strong now."

However, Shepherdson warned that "as sales growth slows in the current quarter, the index will come back down."

Treasury prices moved up. The 10-year gained 4/32 in price and was yielding 4.80%, and the 30-year bond added 3/32, yielding 4.91%.

Overseas, Frankfurt's Xetra DAX eased 0.2% at 6874, and London's FTSE rose 0.1% at 6318. Tokyo's Nikkei sank 1.2% overnight to 17,344, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 0.5% to 20,455.