MIDDAY MARKETS: Earnings and deals drive techs

Another big deal for Time Warner, a slew of earnings, and the year's first IPO were boosting techs at midday Monday. The Nasdaq gained 16.84 to 4,252.24, and the Dow Jones industrial average slipped 29.47 to 11,222.24.

The Inter@ctive Week @Net Index lost 5 to 582.10.

Britain's EMI Group and Time Warner Inc (NYSE: TWX), down 2 1/8 to 63 1/2, said on Monday they were merging their music businesses to create the world's top record company, worth $20 billion, with a powerful presence on the Internet.

AOL (NYSE: AOL), which recently bought Time Warner, lost 1 1/4 to 63 1/2. Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) lost 6 9/16 to 345 3/8.

Amazon.com jumped 9 7/16 to 71 1/2 on a Goldman Sachs upgrade and news of two deals. Amazon boosted its stake in Drugstore.com (Nasdaq: DSCM), up 5 to 34 1/8, and invested in Greenlight.com.

NBC Internet (Nasdaq: NBCI) lost 1 9/16 to 80 15/16 after it said fourth quarter pro forma revenue would be about $27.3 million, up 38 percent from the third quarter. The company didn't give bottom line projections.

Healtheon/WebMD Corp. (Nasdaq: HLTH) was up 7 9/16 to 67 1/8 after it said it will buy the electronic data interchange unit of Quintiles Transnational Corp, in a deal valued at $2.5 billion.

Neoforma.com (Nasadaq: NEOF) shot up 32 3/16 to 45 3/16 after the business-to-business company for the medical supplies industry priced 7 million shares at $13 each.

After warning that fourth quarter earnings would be at the low end of expectations, computer printer maker Lexmark International Group Inc. (NYSE: LXK), up 14 41/64 to 95 1/8, said Monday fourth-quarter profits beat estimates by a nickel.

Siliconix (Nasdaq: SILI) jumped 37 percent, or 61 1/4 to 225 Monday after it announced its fourth quarter results.

Bell Atlantic Corp (NYSE: BEL) was up 1/16 to 60 1/8 after the regional telephone company set to buy GTE Corp., said fourth quarter profits rose 12 percent, in line with Wall Street expectations.

Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN) was up 5 9/64 to 115 15/16 ahead of its earnings, to be reported after the bell. Intel was up 5 7/8 to 103 13/16.

Dell Computer Corp. (Nasdaq: DELL) lost 1 13/16 to 41 15/16 and Compaq Computer Corp. (NYSE: CPQ) rose 1 5/8 to 32 7/8 after Compaq got a "buy" rating upgrade from Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette, and International Data Corp. said it was the No. 1 PC vendor worldwide for 1999.