TECH STOCKS: Sluggish Trading That Ends The Day UpTECH STOCKS: Sluggish Trading That Ends The Day Up

Yom Kippur is characterized by a day of fasting, but it appears it's also an occasion to resist the temptations of Wall Street. The holiday was marked by a listlessness among our indices, all of which posted modest gains on meager volumes.

The tech sector faired well, thanks to two notable announcements: PeopleSoft Inc. said it's third-quarter earnings would be more robust than expected, and Motorola decided to spin off its chip unit to focus on its stronger communications-product business. That led to the software and communications sectors posting the strongest gains.

PeopleSoft was up 3.1%, rival Oracle rose 2.5%, and Siebel Systems also rose 2.5%. Nextel Communications rose 4.1%, Brocade Communications rose 6.9%, and Juniper Networks was up nearly 4%. The Nasdaq-100 tracking stock reflected the sector's strength, rising 16 cents, or 0.5%, to $34.35. Volume, however, was an anemic 45.3 million.

Our information 100 index outperformed the other indices, rising 4.17 points, or 1.5%, to close at 292.43, while the similarly tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite rose 12.91 points, or 0.7%, to 1,893.48. The Dow rose 22.67 points, or 0.2%, to close at 9,594.98, and the S&P 500 rose 4.5 points, or 0.4%, to 1,034.35.