Stocks Opened Up On Earnings, Economic News

U.S. stocks opened modestly higher on Tuesday as investors weighed a mixed bag of earnings and economic news. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lately added 81.48 points, or 0.50% to 16,530.22. The S&P 500 was up 7.65 points, or 0.41%, at 1,877.08. The Nasdaq Composite gained 15.85 points, or 0.39%, to 4,090.25.

Sprint Corp., the third-largest U.S. wireless carrier, said Tuesday that its first-quarter loss narrowed significantly but its ranks of subscribers shrank. For the quarter ended March 31, Sprint posted a loss of $151 million, or 4 cents per share. That compared with a year-ago loss of $643 million, or 21 cents per share in the year-ago quarter. Revenue edged up about 1 percent to $8.88 billion from $8.79 billion.

Home prices in 20 U.S. cities rose at a slower pace in the year ended February as the residential real-estate market cooled. The S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values increased 12.9 percent from February 2013, the smallest 12-month gain since August, after rising 13.2 percent in the year ended in January.

The Senate Banking Committee will open debate on a bill to wind down taxpayer-owned mortgage financiers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on Tuesday, but does not plan any votes as the panel’s leaders scramble for broader support.

Target Corp (TGT), which is recovering from a massive data breach, on Tuesday named high-profile information technology consultant Bob DeRodes as chief information officer.

Barclays PLC  (BCS ) Americas CEO Hugh (Skip) McGee III will be stepping down as head of the U.S. division at the end of April, the firm said in a statement.

Shares of Amicus Therapeutics Inc. (FOLD) surged 52% in premarket action on Tuesday after the biotech firm reported positive results from a late-stage trial of its Fabry-disease treatment. The company said the results of a phase 3 study of its migalastat drug were “statistically significant”.