NEW YORK, July 29 (AFP) - US stocks struggled to keep positive momentum Thursday after a dip in oil prices from record highs and a slew of largely positive profit reports provided an early boost.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average of blue chips clung to a gain of 4.57 points (0.05 percent) at 10,121.64 while the Nasdaq climbed 14.13 points (0.76 percent) to 1,872.39 at 1545 GMT.
The Standard and Poor's broad-market index 500 index advanced 3.26 points (0.30 percent) to 1,098.68.
A drop in crude oil futures from Wednesday's record highs in New York helped sentiment as did mostly upbeat earnings reports.
Wall Street was encouraged by a comeback late Wednesday, even though the major averages ended mixed, with some analysts saying it shows signs of a bottom from which a rally can develop.
"The snapback yesterday afternoon again shows that buyers remain active in their willingness to buy stocks close to support at or near the May lows," said Alfred Goldman at AG Edwards.
"The ball is now in the bulls' court to extend this rally further by generating additional buying momentum. The last two days' action reinforces our opinion that a tradable bottom is in place."
But Paul Mendelsohn, chief investment strategist at Windham Financial Services, said it was too early to say the slump of the past few weeks has ended.
"All we've done so far is just bounced off those (lows), which is positive -- you need to do that before you can build a base -- but it's much too early to say if we've put in a bottom or we're basing here yet," he said.
Analysts said however that much attention was focused on oil prices, which dipped 60 cents in New York to 42.30 dollars a barrel a day after hitting a record of 43.05 dollars a barrel.
The market showed little reaction to a report showing initial jobless claims rose by 4,000 to 345,000 in the week ending July 24, in line with expectations.
Among active shares, ExxonMobil climbed 27 cents to 46.08 as the world's biggest oil company reported a 5.79 billion dollar quarterly profit.
Raytheon rose 78 cents to 33.49 even though the defense contractor said its second quarter earnings were hurt by legal costs.
Northrop Grumman dipped 16 cents to 53.54 after the defense giant reported earnings above most Wall Street forecasts.
EDS rallied 93 cents or nearly six percent to 18.20 as the computer services firm reported a tripling of its quarterly earnings.
But drug giant Bristol-Myers Squibb fell 97 cents to 22.60 after announcing a 41 percent drop in quarterly earnings.
Gillette fell 1.86 to 38.56 as a better-than-expected earnings report and positive outlook failed to win over investors for the razor and consumer goods firm.
Bonds were steady. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury bond eased slightly to 4.583 percent from 4.585 percent Wednesday and that on the 30-year bond edged up to 5.309 percent against 5.306 percent. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.