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From Briefing.com: 4:30 pm : Stocks slumped in early trade, but managed to gradually trim losses throughout the session. The major averages still settled with varied losses, though.

The stock market saw its gains pared in the prior session as profit takers pulled it down from a new multi-year high, but selling pressure was much more pronounced this morning. Weakness abroad and concerns about how global economic growth could be impacted by a slowdown in China stoked selling. Members of the steel and metals industry reportedly expect steel production to ease, while country officials announced another fuel price increase.

Plans to increase fuel prices in China for the second time this year came alongside word that Saudi Arabia will increase oil exports to the U.S. That drove down crude oil prices to $106.10 per barrel for a 2.3% loss. Weekly oil inventory numbers will be posted tomorrow at 10:30 AM ET.

Oil's slide weighed heavily on the Energy sector, which suffered a 1.4% loss. Oil and gas equipment and services plays were among the sector's poorest performers. Other key commodities were caught up in concerted selling, too, such that the CRB Index suffered a 1.2% loss. That stands as its worst single-session slide in two weeks. Gold prices dropped 1.2% to settle pit trade at $1647.30 per ounce, while silver suffered a 3.2% loss by settling at $31.89 per ounce.

A pullback by the dollar took some of the pressure off of precious metals this morning, but the relief was only temporary. Although the greenback ended the day below its best levels, support narrowly above the neutral line helped it secure a 0.2% gain against a basket of major foreign currencies.

Financials were the best performers of the day. The sector overcame some early weakness and even fought through a few flurries of selling that forced it back to the flat line to score a 0.4% gain. Investment banks and brokerages led the way.

Overall action was rather uninspiring, but shares of Tiffany & Co. (TIF 73.27, +4.59) rallied sharply to a new multi-month high in response to strong guidance by the company. Disappointing earnings in its most recent quarter were forgiven.

Economic data today was limited to monthly housing starts, which hit an annualized rate of 698,000 units in February. That's down from the prior month's upwardly revised rate of 706,000 units and less than the pace of 705,000 units that had been broadly expected. Building permits for February improved to a rate of 717,000 from 682,000 in the prior month. That bested the rate of 695,000 that had been expected, on average, by economists polled by Briefing.com. The latest monthly existing home sales numbers will be released Wednesday at 10:00 AM ET.

Advancing Sectors: Financials +0.4%, Consumer Discretionary +0.2%, Utilities +0.1%, Telecom +0.1%
Unchanged: Consumer Staples
Declining Sectors: Tech -0.1%, Health Care -0.5%, Materials -0.6%, Industrials -1.1%, Energy -1.4%DJ30 -68.94 NASDAQ -4.17 NQ100 +0.2% R2K -1.0% SP400 -0.7% SP500 -4.23 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 758/1.50 bln/1771 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 985/710 mln/2000

4:06PM Oracle beats by $0.06, reports revs in-line (ORCL) 30.10 +0.34 : Reports Q3 (Feb) earnings of $0.62 per share, $0.06 better than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of $0.56; revenues rose 3.4% year/year to $9.06 bln vs the $9.03 bln consensus. Oracle reported new software license revenue growth of +8% in constant currency vs +2-12% guidance. "Oracle is on track to deliver the highest operating margins in our history this year... Oracle can achieve these record margins as an integrated hardware and software company because we are focusing on high margin systems where hardware and software are engineered to work together... Hardware revenue for our engineered systems grew 139% this quarter and going into Q4, we have a record pipeline... In applications, Fusion in the Cloud is winning with great success against niche HCM cloud vendors in the US and worldwide. Our modular, integrated platform of 100 apps available in the cloud or on-premise is a key differentiator."

4:04PM Jabil Circuit beats by $0.01, beats on revs; guides Q3 EPS in-line, revs in-line (JBL) 26.49 -0.64 : Reports Q2 (Feb) earnings of $0.58 per share, excluding non-recurring items, $0.01 better than the Capital IQ Consensus Estimate of $0.57; revenues rose 7.8% year/year to $4.24 bln vs the $4.09 bln consensus. Co issues in-line guidance for Q3, sees EPS of $0.60-0.70, excluding non-recurring items, vs. $0.64 Capital IQ Consensus Estimate; sees Q3 revs of $4.2-4.4 bln vs. $4.34 bln Capital IQ Consensus Estimate.

3:39PM Suntech Power responds to U.S. Department of Commerce's preliminary decision to impose countervailing duties of 2.9% on Suntech's crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells imported from China (STP) 3.54 +0.41 : Andrew Beebe, Suntech's Chief Commercial Officer said:
"This initial decision reflects the reality that Suntech's global success is based on free and fair competition. Nonetheless, unilateral trade barriers, large or small, will further delay our transition away from fossil fuels at a time when the majority of Americans demand cleaner and more secure energy such as solar."

"As a global company with global supply chains and manufacturing facilities in three countries, we are well prepared for the future. Regardless whether tariffs are imposed on solar cells from China, we can provide our customers in the U.S. with hundreds of megawatts of high-quality and affordable solar products that are not subject to tariffs. As a local manufacturer with production in Arizona, we will continue to remain an active member of the American solar industry and maintain focus on making solar energy affordable for everyone, everywhere."

11:23AM Semiconductor Hldrs ETF displaying some relative strength in recent trade, notches minor new rebound/session high (SMH) 35.48 -0.16 : KLAC is probing yesterday's multi-week high at 52.56. Its Jan/52-wk peak is at 53.05. INTC +0.4%, NVLS +0.7%, ARMH +1%.

Xilinx (XLNX) underscored its commitment to the emerging, high-growth market and its growing employee base in India with the inauguration of a new, expanded Xilinx India site in Hi-Tech city. The 131,000 square-foot office building is more than double the size of the previous site to accommodate engineering labs and collaboration space for end-to-end product development.

Qualcomm Atheros, the networking and connectivity subsidiary of Qualcomm (QCOM), announced the optimized new time division multiple access software for Ethernet-over-Coax applications and Qualcomm Atheros' first entry-level EoC solution, the QCA6411 chipset, that provide, end-to-end broadband access solutions for Chinese multi-system operators.

Freescale Semiconductor (FSL) announced a partnership with First Automobile Works, and the establishment of a FAW-Freescale joint automotive lab. The joint lab will be established in the Technology Center of FAW and will be a shared research and development lab focusing on new technology R&D, powertrain control, chassis control, active safety, new energy technologies and other automotive electronics

AMD (AMD) announced the latest solution as part of its ongoing Web/Cloud initiative with the launch of the new AMD Opterom 3200 Series processor.

Adobe Systems (ADBE $33.11 -1.40) reported first quarter earnings of $0.57 per share, excluding non-recurring items, in-line with the Capital IQ Consensus of $0.57, while revenues rose 1.7% year/year to $1.04 billion versus the $1.05 bln consensus. The company issued in-line guidance for the second quarter with EPS of $0.57-0.61, excluding non-recurring items, versus the $0.60 consensus with revenues of $1.09-1.14 billion versus the $1.1 bln consensus. The company issued guidance for fiscal year 2012 with the Efficient Frontier acquisition, it raised its EPS to $2.38-2.48 from $2.37-2.47, may not be comparable to $2.42 consensus and raised revenues to +6-8% YoY (from +4-6%) to approximately $4.47-4.55 billion, may not be comparable to $4.41 billion consensus Estimate. Deferred revenue grew by $17.3 million quarter over quarter to a total of $549.0 million. "We delivered solid earnings in Q1, achieved revenue within our targeted range and began to build excitement for our upcoming creative product release."

Apple (AAPL $596.56 -4.44) announced it has sold three million of its new iPad, since its launch on Friday, March 16. "The new iPad is a blockbuster with three million sold - the strongest iPad launch yet"

OmniVision (OVTI $19.58 -0.15) was Upgraded to Buy from Hold at Needham on higher ests on iPad 3 momentum and sets target price at $24. While they initially believed Samsung was slotted for the 5MP socket for the iPad 3, according to thirdparty teardown sites, OVTI is supplying both the 5MP BSI-2 back-camera and 0.3 VGA front-camera. This news is consistent with OVTI's above-consensus guidance and checks that indicate OVTI has meaningfully increased its capacity at TSMC. With an iPad 3 design win, the upside to revenues and earnings would be significant.

09:13 am OmniVision upgraded to Buy at Needham: . Needham upgrades OVTI to Buy from Hold on higher ests on iPad 3 momentum and sets target price at $24. While they initially believed Samsung was slotted for the 5MP socket for the iPad 3, according to thirdparty teardown sites, OVTI is supplying both the 5MP BSI-2 back-camera and 0.3 VGA front-camera. This news is consistent with OVTI's above-consensus guidance ($35MM+) and checks that indicate OVTI has meaningfully increased its capacity at TSMC. With an iPad 3 design win, the upside to revenues and earnings would be significant.

09:36 am Adobe shares fall by nearly 4% following miss on revenues

Adobe Systems (ADBE $33.09 -1.41) reported first quarter earnings of $0.57 per share, excluding non-recurring items, in-line with the Capital IQ Consensus of $0.57, while revenues rose 1.7% year/year to $1.04 billion versus the $1.05 bln consensus. The company issued in-line guidance for the second quarter with EPS of $0.57-0.61, excluding non-recurring items, versus the $0.60 consensus with revenues of $1.09-1.14 billion versus the $1.1 bln consensus.

The company issued guidance for fiscal year 2012 with the Efficient Frontier acquisition, it raised its EPS to $2.38-2.48 from $2.37-2.47, may not be comparable to $2.42 consensus and raised revenues to +6-8% YoY (from +4-6%) to approximately $4.47-4.55 billion, may not be comparable to $4.41 billion consensus Estimate. Deferred revenue grew by $17.3 million quarter over quarter to a total of $549.0 million. "We delivered solid earnings in Q1, achieved revenue within our targeted range and began to build excitement for our upcoming creative product release."