April 28, 2014: Markets opened higher on Monday with little economic data to drive the market either up or down. Consequently shares fell then rose and look to be headed for small positive close for the day. Shortly before the closing bell the DJIA was up 0.67%, the S&P 500 was up 0.49%, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.16%.

Leading the DJIA higher today was Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) which traded up 4.10% at $32.00 and came within a buck of the stock’s 52-week high. Pfizer’s continued pursuit of AstraZeneca for a price that will probably exceed $100 billion drove the shares higher. The stock’s 52-week range is $27.12 to $32.96. Share volume was more than double the daily average of around 28 million shares traded.

Dow heavyweight Visa Inc. (NYSE: V) traded up 1.34% at $201.59 in a 52-week range of $163.60 to $235.50. Volume was about 35% higher than the daily average of around 3.7 million shares. Visa and competitor MasterCard will stop processing transactions from two more Russian banks that have been added to the list of companies and people hit by U.S. sanctions for Russia’s incursion in the Crimea..

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) traded today at $40.87, posting a gain of 2.43% shortly before the closing bell. The stock’s 52-week range is $30.84 to $41.66. Share volume was about 20% higher than the daily average of around 38 million shares traded. A warning of a security flaw in Internet Explorer appears to have had no impact on the share price.

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Nasdaq and S&P 500 stock Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) traded up 4.02% today at $594.94 in a 52-week range of $388.87 to $595.00, a new high set late in the afternoon. Volume was about double the daily average of nearly 11 million shares.

Of the Dow 30 stocks 21 were set to close higher today while 9 look to close lower.

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