Markets closed largely unchanged as cheer about a decline in jobless claims dissipated and uncertainty ahead of the U.S. presidential election was weighed on stocks. Initial jobless claimes declined 30,000 to 339,000, the lowest since February 2008. The U.S. trade deficit expanded 4% in August as slowing global growth cut demand for U.S. goods, with American exports down to their lowest since February. Tech stocks ended up mixed. Gartner reported an 8.3% drop in PC shipments during the quarter, the greatest year-over-year decline since 2001, noting that Lenovo Group had eclipsed H-P to become the top PC seller worldwide. Separately, IDC said PC shipments fell by 8.6% but still listed H-P as slightly ahead of Lenovo for the top spot in worldwide sales. Among leading PC companies Hewlett-Packard Co. HPQ +0.49% shares added 0.49%, while Dell gave up 0.85%. Sprint Nextel soared 14.3% after the co. confirmed Japanese mobile-carrier Softbank was in talks to buy a majority stake in Sprint. Also, Take-Two Interactive climbed 6.3%, reporting that “Grand Theft Auto V” game could be released during the company’s current fiscal year. Groupon added almost 4% to after the co. announced the launch of Breadcrumb, a point-of-sale technology for restaurants, cafes and bars that runs on Apple Inc.’s iPad, and said it plans to charge at least $99 a month for retailers to use the service. Advanced Micro Devices dropped 10% after the closing bell after co. said it now expects sales in the third quarter to decline 10% from the second quarter, citing “weaker-than-expected demand across all product lines caused by the challenging macroeconomic environment.
