* Alcoa up 3.9 pct after bell, reports profit
* Resource companies' shares drag on broader market
* Dow up 0.2 pct, S&P up 0.1 pct, Nasdaq up 0.1 pct
* For up-to-the-minute market news see []
(Adds Alcoa's gain after the bell, quote and volume)
By Leah Schnurr
NEW YORK, July 12 (Reuters) - Caution prevailed in the U.S. stock
market on Monday, with indexes edging higher as investors kept bets
to a minimum in front of earnings.
Volume was among the lightest of the year with investors wanting
to see if corporate outlooks validate last week's surge, the
strongest week in a year. Dow component Alcoa Inc <AA.N> reported its
second-quarter results after the closing bell.
Earnings are "going to be the test to the durability of the
bounce that started last week," said Scott Marcouiller, senior equity
market strategist at Wells Fargo Advisors in St. Louis.
The aluminum producer reported a second-quarter profit as sales
rose 22 percent. Alcoa slipped 0.6 percent to $10.87 during the
session, but jumped 3.9 percent after the bell.
"It was better than expected. We were hoping that Alcoa would
have at least numbers that would match expectations, and obviously
they did better, and that's comforting," said Charles Lieberman,
chief investment officer of Advisors Capital Management, LLC in
Paramus, New Jersey.
"This clearly gives us a good start for tomorrow."
The Dow Jones industrial average <> added 18.24 points, or
0.18 percent, to end at 10,216.27. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index
<.SPX> edged up just 0.79 of a point, or 0.07 percent, to 1,078.75.
The Nasdaq Composite Index <> gained 1.91 points, or 0.09
percent, to close at 2,198.36.
Resource companies' shares were the biggest drag overall, with
the S&P materials index <.GSPM> sliding 1.1 percent after Chinese
data over the weekend showed the country's copper demand dropped.
Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc <FCX.N> lost 4.2 percent to
$63.22.
U.S.-listed shares of BP Plc <BP.N> jumped 8 percent to $36.76
with the British company in talks with U.S. oil and gas company
Apache Corp <APA.N> and others to sell assets worth up to $10
billion. For details, see []
In addition to Alcoa, other Dow components set to report earnings
this week include Intel Corp <INTC.O>, JPMorgan Chase & Co <JPM.N>
and General Electric Co <GE.N>.
For the second quarter, analysts see earnings growth of 27
percent for companies in the S&P 500, according to Thomson Reuters
data, up from previous readings in the past three quarters, which
hovered around 22 percent. This would also exceed the 22.4 percent
analysts were predicting at the beginning of the year.
[]
The market got some support from M&A activity after Aon Corp
<AON.N> said it will buy Hewitt Associates Inc <HEW.N> for $4.9
billion to create the world's largest human resource services
company. Hewitt surged 32.2 percent to $46.79, while Aon sagged 7.1
percent to $35.62. []
Also on the upside, Qualcomm Inc <QCOM.O> climbed 3.5 percent to
$35.10 after Goldman Sachs added the company to its conviction buy
list, saying the cellphone chip maker is a key beneficiary of
accelerating smartphone growth. []
About 6.34 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange,
the American Stock Exchange and Nasdaq, well below last year's
estimated daily average of 9.65 billion, and making this the
second-lowest volume day of the year.
Despite the stock indexes' slim gains for the day, the market's
breadth was decidedly negative.
Declining stocks beat advancers by a ratio of almost 2 to 1 on
the NYSE, while on the Nasdaq, more than two stocks fell for every
one that rose.
(Reporting by Leah Schnurr; Additional reporting by Matthew Lynley;
Editing by Jan Paschal)
