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From Briefing.com: Wednesday was hump day and the stock market couldn't get over the hump. It fell prone to some selling activity that was concentrated primarily in the Russell 2000 (-1.0%) and Nasdaq Composite (-0.6%). The S&P 500 slipped just three points, or 0.15%, meaning one had to round up to make the claim that the market dropped 0.2%.

The S&P 500 information technology sector (-0.6%) fell in-line with the Nasdaq where many technology stocks are listed. It did so without a whole lot of news driving the retreat, which appeared to be largely a function of profit-taking efforts following a big run.

Apple (AAPL 114.66, -0.81), Facebook (FB 73.33, -1.01), Intel (INTC 34.35, -0.36), Microsoft (MSFT 48.22, -0.52), Qualcomm (QCOM 70.44, -1.54), Salesforce.com (CRM 61.02, -1.45), and Yahoo (YHOO 50.58, -1.17) were just a few of the widely-held stocks that were on the defensive.

Altogether 51 of the sector's 66 components shed some ground on Wednesday, none more so than Avago Technologies (AVGO 89.25, -2.16), a supplier to Apple, which dropped 2.4% after gaining 33% from its October 10 low.

Notably, Qualcomm's weakness came after the company reaffirmed its FY15 EPS guidance of $5.05-5.35 at its analyst day and noted that it sees a 5-year compounded annual growth rate of 8-10%.

Salesforce.com, meanwhile, got hit ahead of its third quarter earnings report after the close. That report was better than expected, yet the company issued guidance for the fourth quarter and fiscal year that was below analysts' expectations. Shares of CRM were down 4.0% in extended action as of this writing.

Speaking of profit taking, Alibaba (BABA 108.82, -1.99) continued to cool off after its white-hot rally that produced a 45% gain in the stock between its October 15 low and its November 13 high. Over the last four sessions, BABA has declined 9.0%.

Yahoo has seen its recent returns tempered with Alibaba's weakness, slipping 3.5% from Monday's high. It was thrust into the news on Wednesday after a ReCode story said Yahoo is looking at additional acquisitions to help bolster its display business. The same article floated the idea that Yahoo might even find it within itself to consider buying Blackberry (BBRY 10.19, -0.57), although such a deal was seen as unlikely.

Moving along, the semiconductor stocks succumbed to some selling interest as well. Following Tuesday's 1.9% gain, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index dipped 0.7%.

The majority of its components had a hand in that loss, although RF Micro Devices (RFMD 13.89, +0.14) was one that bucked the trend. It jumped 1.0% after Canaccord Genuity raised its price target to $18 from $16 and maintained its Buy rating on the stock. Separately, Craig Hallum also sounded a positive note on the company ahead of its pending merger with TriQuint Semiconductor ( 23.17, +0.24). The combined company is going to be named Qorvo.

Fellow semiconductor component NVIDIA (NVDA 20.01, -0.16) was on the weaker side of things after disclosing that Samsung filed a patent infringement and false advertisement complaint against it on November 10.

4:31 pm Semtech beats by $0.02, beats on revs; guides Q4 EPS below consensus, revs below consensus (SMTC) : Reports Q3 (Oct) earnings of $0.46 per share, excluding non-recurring items, $0.02 better than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of $0.44; revenues rose 5.5% year/year to $148.9 mln vs the $146.29 mln consensus. Co issues downside guidance for Q4, sees EPS of $0.32-0.34 vs. $0.41 Capital IQ Consensus Estimate; sees Q4 revs of $128-132 mln vs. $140.11 mln Capital IQ Consensus Estimate.

4:11 pm Closing Market Summary: Small Caps Lead Stocks Lower (:WRAPX) : The major averages ended the midweek session on a lower note with Tuesday's leader-Russell 2000-pacing the retreat. The small-cap index lost 1.1% while the S&P 500 surrendered 0.2% with seven sectors finishing in the red.

The benchmark index slumped at the start due to notable losses among several heavily-weighted sectors. However, the S&P 500 was able to pull away from its late-morning low thanks to relative strength in consumer discretionary (+0.5%), consumer staples (+0.4%), and energy (+0.6%).

Although the trio helped the S&P 500 recover from its low, the index could not complete its comeback as industrials (-0.3%), technology (-0.6%), and health care (-0.5%) weighed. The index was able to briefly kiss the flat line after minutes from the October FOMC meeting crossed the wires, but that move was retraced as the dust settled and it became clear the minutes did not introduce anything new into the discussion. Instead, the minutes reminded investors for the umpteenth time that the central bank intends to remain data-dependent when deciding the appropriate timing for the first rate hike.

Treasuries followed a similar intraday pattern. The 10-yr note spiked to highs immediately after the release, but returned to lows shortly thereafter. As a result, the benchmark 10-yr yield rose four basis points to 2.36%.

As mentioned earlier, only three sectors managed to spend the bulk of the session in the green. Energy (+0.6%) ended in the lead even as crude oil remained volatile during the day. WTI crude ended the pit session lower by 0.2% at $74.48/bbl.

Elsewhere, the two consumer sectors were underpinned by retailers after Staples (SPLS 13.92, +1.16), Target (TGT 72.48, +4.97), and Lowe's (LOW 62.26, +3.73) reported one-cent beats. The three soared between 6.4% and 9.1% while the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (XRT 91.04, +0.67) added 0.7%.

Retail names notwithstanding, finding areas of relative strength proved challenging. The top-weighted technology sector (-0.6%) ended among the laggards due to broad-based losses. Chipmakers settled in-line with the sector as the relative weakness among small caps weighed on sentiment in other high-beta areas.

Also of note, biotechnology tried to resists the pressure, but the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (IBB 294.21, -1.04) slipped to lows by the close. The ETF settled lower by 0.4% after being up near 0.6% intraday. As for health care, the top-weighted countercyclical group never took the biotech bait and spent the day near its low.

Participation was in-line with long-term trends with roughly 720 million shares changing hands at the NYSE floor.

Economic data was limited to MBA Mortgage Index and Housing Starts/Building Permits:


Housing starts declined 2.8% in October from an upwardly revised 1.038 million (from 1.017 million) to 1.009 million while the Briefing.com consensus pegged the reading at 1.025 million
Since June, housing starts have followed a sawtooth pattern, which has continued with the October decline
Despite the headline miss, single-family construction, which generally follows stable trends, increased 4.2% to 696,000, which was the highest reading since November 2013
Building permits slipped to a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 1.08 million in October from an unrevised 1.031 million for September, while the Briefing.com consensus expected permits to come in at 1.04 million.
The weekly MBA Mortgage Index jumped 4.9% to follow the previous decline of 0.9%

Tomorrow, weekly Initial Claims (Briefing.com consensus 285K) and October CPI (expected -0.1%) will be released at 8:30 ET while October Existing Home Sales (consensus 5.17 million), October Leading Indicators (expected 0.6%), and the Philadelphia Fed Survey for November (consensus 18.0) will all be reported at 10:00 ET.
Nasdaq Composite +12.0% YTD
S&P 500 +10.8% YTD
Dow Jones Industrial Average +6.7% YTD
Russell 2000 -0.5% YTD

3:47 pm Xilinx and NXP (NXPI) collaborate to reduce CapEx and OpEx costs of wireless infrastructure radios; to combine XLNX's SmartCORE IP with NXP's Gen9 LDMOS RF (XLNX) : Co and NXP (NXPI) announced their collaboration to reduce CapEx and OpEx costs of wireless infrastructure radios.
The two companies have been working together to enable customers to quickly and easily combine Xilinx's newest crest factor reduction and digital pre-distortion SmartCORE IP with NXP's Gen9 LDMOS RF highly efficient power amplifier technology. The combination of NXP's advanced power amplifier devices and Xilinx All Programmable devices and radio IP enables customers to implement smaller, lighter and higher reliability radios suitable for use in next-generation wireless infrastructure equipment.

11:56 am Notable movers of interest (:SCANX) : The following are some of today's most notable movers of interest, categorized by market capitalization (large cap over $10 billion and mid cap between $2-10 billion) and ranked by % change (all stocks over 100K average daily volume).

Large Cap Gainers

LOW (62.34 +6.51%): Beat Q3 consensus estimates by $0.01, reported revs in-line; raised FY15 EPS above consensus, revs above consensus; Upgraded at Canaccorrd Genuity.
TGT (72.21 +6.96%): Reported Q3 (Oct) earnings of $0.54 per share, $0.07 better than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of $0.47; revenues rose 2.7% year/year to $17.73 bln vs the $17.56 bln consensus; guided Q4 EPS in-line.
POT (36.25 +2.41%): Upgraded to Outperform from Mkt Perform at Raymond James; tgt raised to $40 from $38.50.

Large Cap Losers

VIPS (22.1 -6.79%): Reported Q3 results that beat consensus estimates by $0.01, beat on revs; guided Q4 revs above consensus; results demonstrated a sequential decline in non-GAAP operating margin.
ABX (12.65 -4.82%): Weakness in gold stocks as the precious metal drops $20 on the day following a Swiss Poll on a referendum to increase bank gold reserves which failed to gain the necessary 50% majority for approval (GG also lower).
TSLA (246.76 -4.25%): Dropping following a Morgan Stanley revision on estimates in which they cut their FY15 EPS expectations below consensus.

Mid Cap Gainers

AGIO (93.96 +12.11%): Announced early Phase 1 data showing clinical activity of AG-120 as a single agent in advanced acute myeloid leukemia; tgt raised to $111 at Canaccord Genuity, Buy rating maintained.
SPLS (13.83 +8.39%): Reported Q3 (Oct) earnings of $0.37 per share, excluding non-recurring items, $0.01 better than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of $0.36; revenues fell 2.5% year/year to $5.96 bln vs the $5.95 bln consensus.; Guided Q4 EPS & revs in-line.
MAC (75.12 +7.5%): Simon Property Group (SPG) discloses 3.6% ownership stake in Macerich and may seek waiver of excess share provision.

Mid Cap Losers

CSTM (17.91 -14.59%): Reported Q3 (Sep) earnings of 0.31 per share, excluding non-recurring items, 0.01 worse than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of 0.32; revenues rose 7.5% year/year to 927 mln vs the 906.52 mln consensus.
SNCR (42.13 -11.51%): Downgraded to Underperform at Robert W. Baird; tgt lowered to $42.
BBRY (10.17 -5.48%): Downgraded to Underweight from Equal-Weight at Morgan Stanley.

11:54 am Stocks/ETFs that traded to new 52 week highs/lows this session - New lows (106) outpacing new highs (77) (:SCANX) : Stocks that traded to 52 week highs: AAC, ABMD, AEC, AGIO, AINC, AIV, ALKS, APD, ARG, ASML, AVGO, AVNR, BSF, CAG, COO, COST, CQB, CSL, DISH, DPLO, EA, ENFC, EPB, FARM, GTIM, HIG, HNH, HQY, HSIC, JACK, JAH, JBLU, JBSS, JLL, KMP, KMR, KTWO, LNDC, LOW, LWAY, MAC, MAG, MCK, MMP, MNDO, MSTR, MUSA, NCLH, NKE, NTES, NYMT, OMER, OPLK, PEI, PETM, PGRE, PPS, QTNT, RCL, RDWR, RDY, REGN, RSTI, SBFG, SERV, SFBC, SHLX, SHW, SWKS, TGT, TXT, UUU, VOYA, WBB, WGP, WHR, WMT

Stocks that traded to 52 week lows: ABCO, ACST, ADGE, AEZS, AMRK, ANGI, APDN, AVL, AVP, BANX, BAS, BBL, BCOR, BONE, BTE, CALL, CEO, CGIX, CHLN, COOL, CRNT, CRR, CVEO, CYNI, DCIX, DNR, DRWI, DSX, DWSN, DXYN, EBR.B, ECT, ENVA, EVGN, EZCH, FCSC, FES, FORD, FOXF, FXEN, GHL, GKNT, GRAM, HMG, HNR, HSON, HTWR, IKGH, ISH, JASN, JGW, KTOS, LAS, LEU, LPI, LPTN, LQDT, MDAS, MILL, MIND, NADL, NAME, NAP, NEWS, NTP, ORPN, PARR, PGRE, PHMD, PICO, PKD, PTEN, RCPI, RIG, RIO, RLOG, RPXC, RVLT, SARA, SDLP, SHOS, SID, SM, SMT, TAS, TEU, TGA, TRXC, TS, TX, UAMY, ULTR, UNT, USEG, UVV, VALE, VALE.P, VIVO, VLTC, VRTS, VVUS, WF, WSTL, XUE, ZEUS, ZU

ETFs that traded to 52 week highs: OEF, PPH, RTH, SMH, XLP, XLY

ETFs that traded to 52 week lows: EWY, FXY, OIL, SLX, USO

6:07 am Trina Solar signs 10 MW EPC turnkey solutions agreement with Shamsuna Power in Jordan (TSL) : Co announced that it has entered into an agreement for the design, build and operation and maintenance of the 10 MW Shamsuna Solar Project in Aqaba, Jordan with Shamsuna Power Company. Foursan Capital Partners will hold a 85% stake and Shamasuna Power will hold a 15% stake in the project, respectively.

The project is being financed by International Finance Corporation and a small syndicate of lenders. Construction of the project is scheduled to commence in December 2014 with completion and grid connection expected in the second quarter of 2015. Once the plant is completed, Trina Solar will provide Operation and Maintenance services on the project based on a 5 year service agreement with a possible 5 year extension upon mutual agreement.
Once operational, it will be the largest solar farm in Aqaba, Jordan.