Blue Chips Gaining, but Tech's Got Troubles

Updated from 10:56 a.m. EDT

Stocks traded mixed Monday as blue chips made a modest recovery from the giant selloff in the previous session with help from positive housing-sector news, even as tech shares remained stuck in the red.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 96 points, or 0.8%, to 12,305, and the S&P 500 was adding 6 points, or 0.4%, to 1367. The Nasdaq Composite gave up 17 points, or 0.7%, to 2458 as big tech names Cisco (CSCO Quote), Apple (AAPL Quote) and Google (GOOG Quote) saw weakness.

Blue-chip gains piled higher, however, after the National Association of Realtors said pending-home sales swelled 6.3% in April, far better than the economists' consensus for a 1% drop and up from a March decline of 1%. ...