Dow Inches Toward 10,000

Stocks inched higher in the early going, as the

Dow Jones Industrial Average

gained 21 to 9980, crawling ever closer to the 10,000 level.

The Dow got a boost when component

Union Carbide

(UK)

began trading. It was up 2 1/2, or 6%, to 46. Union Carbide this morning said first-quarter operating earnings should come in within a few cents of the highest-published

First Call

analyst estimate, which is 47 cents. The current 10-analyst consensus estimate has Union Carbide earning 34 cents a share in the first quarter.

Elsewhere, the

S&P 500

was up 3 to 1310.

The

Nasdaq Composite Index

was up 5 to 2436. The

Russell 2000

was up 1 to 402.

TheStreet.com Internet Sector

was up 10 to 615.

TheStreet.com E-Commerce Index

was up 5 to 115.

The 30-year Treasury bond was up 4/32 to 96 5/32, yielding 5.51%.

Most Up at Open -- NYSE

Teradyne (TER) - Get Report, up 2 9/16 to 54

.

Most Up at Open -- Nasdaq

Go2Net (GNET) , up 14 5/8 to 128

: Paul Allen, co-founder of

Microsoft

(MSFT) - Get Report

, said yesterday he would invest up to $750 million in Go2Net for a controlling stake in the company.

Most Down at Open -- NYSE

Procter & Gamble (PG) - Get Report, down 1 3/16 to 90 1/2

.

Most Down at Open -- Nasdaq

Xoom.com (XMCM) , down 2 5/8 to 67

: The company filed with the

Securities and Exchange Commission

for an offering of 4 million common shares.