[10:30AM New York – U.S. stocks trade sideways as oil and gold are near elevated levels and jobless claims rise at the end of last week.

Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 50.16 to 13,093.98, Nasdaq declined 2.40 to 2,608.48, and S&P 500 increased 5.64 to 1,452.80.

Oil and gold are trending lower by a fraction but are still trading near the record levels.

Wheat futures are up 2.6% to 938.75 cents per bushel in New York Mercantile Exchange trading. Soybean futures are up 1.4% or 4.60 cents to 348.70 cents and sugar futures added 2.2% or 0.23 to 10.96 cents.

The Labor Department reported weekly jobless claims fell 21,000 to 336,000 at the end of the last week. In a separate report published by Automatic Data Processing and Macroeconomic Advisers showed that the December private sector payroll increased 40,000. The Labor Department is scheduled to issue its report on the December payroll tomorrow.

Ford Motor is in advanced talks with Tata Group of India to sell its luxury division. The division includes brands such as Jaguar and Land Rover, has struggled in the past on high operating cost, strategic focus, and rising competition from German makers.

Monsanto (MON: chart) jumped 5% to $5.65 to $117.19 after it released its first quarter earnings.

The company reported net sales of $2.1 billion for the first quarter of fiscal year 2008, which were 36 percent higher than those in the first quarter of fiscal year 2007. The results in the quarter reflect the strong performance of the company''s businesses outside the United States. Key drivers for the quarter were increased sales of agricultural herbicides in Brazil, Argentina and Europe, as well as stronger adoption of the company''s seed and trait technologies in Brazil and Argentina.

For the first quarter of fiscal year 2008, Monsanto recorded net income of $256 million compared with net income of $90 million for the same period last year. Earnings per share for the quarter, both on an as-reported and ongoing basis, were 46 cents a share compared to 16 cents a year ago.

The company raised its annual earnings guidance between $2.50 and $2.60 per share.

State Street (STT: chart) rose 7% or $5.68 to $84.52 after it said that it has booked a reserve of $618 million to cover losses from fixed income investments.

State Street announced today that it will record a net charge, after taxes, in the fourth quarter of 2007 of $279 million, or $0.71 per share. The purpose of the charge is to establish a reserve to address legal exposure and other costs associated with the underperformance of certain active fixed-income strategies managed by State Street Global Advisors, the company’s investment management arm.

In aggregate, the reserve will be $618 million on a pre-tax basis. The impact to earnings of the net charge, after taking into account the tax effect of the reserve and associated lower incentive compensation cost, will be $279 million.

The press release from State Street also said that State Street also announced that James S. Phalen, currently executive vice president and head of international operations for investment servicing and investment research and trading, is returning to SSgA as interim president and chief executive officer. Phalen, age 57, succeeds William W. Hunt who has resigned from State Street.

9:00AM New York, 7:30PM Mumbai - Sensex stocks fell, dragged by cement and IT shares.

On the second day of 2008, the Sensex on the Bombay Stock Exchange fell on loses recorded in cement and IT shares and in large cap stocks.

The 30-share BSE Sensex eased 0.6% or 120.10 at 20,345.20 and CNX Nifty fell 0.1% to 6,178.55.

Cement stocks declined on heavy selling following government''s warning that it will take over all cement factories, which defy its directive to control cement prices.

Grasim led the losers from the Sensex index. The stock plunged 4% to 3,606 rupees. ACC fell 1.8% to 1,004 rupees, India Cements retreated 2.9% to 298 rupees while Ambuja Cements fell 1.7% to 146 rupees.

IT shares also extended their recent loses on the BSE. Loses were also visible in TCS Wipro, Satyam Computers and Infosys Technologies.