US stocks give up most early gains, tech stocks higher

NEW YORK (AP) — Investors appeared to turn cautious Tuesday as U.S. stocks relinquished most of an early gain on Wall Street.

Stocks were just about evenly split between gainers and losers in the S&P 500, with technology and communications companies leading the gains. Adobe rose 1.9%, Facebook added 1.2% and Alphabet rose 1%.

Payment processing and related companies gained ground after Global Payments said it would buy Total System Services for $21.5 billion. PayPal rose 2.1% and Verisign rose 1%.

The market is coming off its third straight weekly loss. U.S. markets were closed Monday for the Memorial Day holiday.

Trading has been choppy over the last several weeks as investors grapple with the possibility of a prolonged trade war between the U.S. and China. The nations escalated the dispute earlier this month by raising tariffs on each other.

The U.S. went even further and proposed a ban on technology sales to certain Chinese companies. That has added even more volatility to technology stocks that are already sensitive to the ups and downs of trade negotiations.

Utilities and consumer staples lagged the market as investors signaled more confidence in growth by focusing on riskier stock holdings.

But, bond prices rose and pushed down the yield on the 10 year Treasury to 2.28%, its lowest level since October 2017. That held back gains for banks and other financial companies that rely on higher yields to make more profit from interest on loans.

Rising bond prices are normally a sign that investors feel jittery about long-term growth prospects and would rather put their money into safer holdings. Morgan Stanley is warning that the stock market faces a lot more volatility because of weak economic data and the trade war. It also cautioned that those factors are also...