Stocks turned mostly higher yesterday, setting more records and overcoming a mild spurt of profit-taking for the second straight day. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average dropped 30.64 points - or 0.38 per cent - to 8,129.71, but most market measures finished higher, with the technology-heavy Nasdaq market posting a sizeable gain and the Standard and Poor's 500 closing at a record high for the third straight day.

The Dow, which slid as much as 70 points early in the day, pulled back after a six-session gain of 450 points, or 6 per cent. Technology shares led the turnaround, bolstered by yesterday's healthy profit reports by Cisco Systems, the bellwether of the computer networking sector, and Peoplesoft, a leading business software company. The rebound stumbled briefly in the afternoon even though the Federal Reserve, as expected, concluded a two-day meeting with no change in the central bank's key lending rates.