Higher Open Ahead Of Fed Meeting

The markets opened higher with the Dow climbing 91 points to 10,699 ahead of the Federal Reserve meeting this week. Nasdaq soared 24 points to 2340.

On the upside

Chelsea Therapeutics (Nasdaq: CHTP) reported upbeat results from a Phase III clinical trial of its low blood pressure treatment Northera.

French aerospace company Safran will pay approximately $1.09 billion to acquire biometrics firm L-1 Identity Solutions (NYSE: ID) .

IBM (NYSE: IBM) offered approximately $1.7 billion to acquire data warehousing and analysis company Netezza (NYSE: NZ).

On the downside

Goldman Sachs downgraded U. S. Steel (NYSE: X) and lowered its price target on the company.

Owens Corning (NYSE: OC) blamed weakness in roofing shingle demand for warning that the high end of its full year outlook will not be achievable.

The Finanical Times reported that stress tests for Greek banks were postponed by the European Commission. Shares of National Bank of Greece (NYSE: NBG) slipped.

In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 7 to 5 on the NYSE and by more than 9 to 7 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks rose 3 points to 651.