MARKET PREVIEW: All eyes on Yahoo!

Expect techs to recover from Tuesday's slow finish, and charge ahead as Yahoo! kicks off earnings season Wednesday. Asia and Europe were mixed, and the Dow is set to open flat.

U.S.

Techs took off Tuesday morning, fueled by expectations of strong second quarter earnings, but finally ran out of steam after six consecutive days of record-breaking gains, and retreated just before market close. Nets are likely to react to the rise or fall of Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO), set to report second quarter earnings Wednesday afternoon, expected at 8 cents a share.

Chip sales are rebounding, according to statistics from the Semiconductor Industry Association that say global semiconductor sales rose 12 percent in May from a year earlier. Strong sales in Japan contributed to the rise in sales from $10.09 billion in May 1998 to $11.28 billion in May 1999.

Expect the following technology stocks to be among Wednesday's most actively traded issues: Engineering Animation Inc. (Nasdaq: EAII), New Era of Networks Inc. (Nasdaq: NEON), Vantive Corp. (Nasdaq: VNTV) and ValueVision Inc. (Nasdaq: VVTV).

In other Nasdaq news, Musicmaker.com Inc.(Nasdaq: HITS) is scheduled to hit the market today, while Internet bookseller Barnesandnoble.com (Nasdaq: BNBN) is expected to announce the launch of its online music store, according to a Wednesday report in the Wall Street Journal.

And the Qwest Communications International Inc. (Nasdaq: QWST)- Global Crossing Ltd. (Nasdaq: GBLX) saga continues. US West Inc. (NYSE:USW) will attempt to merge with Qwest as an equal, rather than in a takeover, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Late computer-programmed sell orders eroded what was a nice rally Tuesday as the Dow Jones industrial average fell 4 points to close at 11,135.12 while the Nasdaq composite fell 5 points to end at 2,736.46.

At the Bell

The Dow Jones industrial average is set to open flat. The Standard & Poor's 500 index for June futures contracts was up just 0.1 to 1403 at 7:20 a.m. EST in 24-hour electronic trading.

The Inter@ctive Week @Net Index rose 1.63 to 323.

Asia

Trading in Asia inched down. The Nikkei 225 slipped 0.51 percent to 17,598. Singapore's Strait Times index dropped 1.42 percent to 2,144 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.80 percent to 14257.

Europe

European markets were mixed. London's FTSE 100 rose 0.16 percent to 6,631. The CAC 40 in Paris fell 0.96 percent to 4,647 and the Xetra DAX in Frankfurt was down 0.33 percent to 5,594 at 6:40 a.m. EST.

Reuters contributed to this report.