bird take-off
Steve-h on Flickr
Stocks rose tentatively on another day of little news. But first, your scoreboard:
Dow: 12,128; +26 pts; +0.22%

NASDAQ: 2,778; +18 pts; +0.66%

S&P 500: 1,285; +7 pts; +0.57%

Here are the day's top stories:

  • G7 leaders held an emergency phone call, allegedly to discuss the crisis in Europe. However, various statements from finance ministers and sources close to those on the call produced an ambiguous picture of the conversations that took place. 


  • European markets closed mostly higher, with the French CAC 40 gaining 1.07 percent and Spain and Italy both higher. The FTSE 100, however, closed down 1.14 percent. 

  • May ISM services data beat expectations, with the index rising to 53.7 versus expectations of a slight drop to 53.4. This stands in contrast to the whirlwind of bad data that came out yesterday. 


  • Morgan Stanley agreed to pay a $5 million fine by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission for unlawful trades it processed through the CME and CBOT. The trades constituted "fictitious sales" and created false prices because they were executed non-competitively and outside of certain rules.



  • AP reported that a U.S. drone strike succeeded in killing top al Qaeda strategist Abu Yahya al-Libi on Monday. Three strikes over the weekend killed 27 people, some of whom were civilians, during two drone attacks on funeral parties.


  • Shares of Facebook traded below $26 today, as the anti-$FB momentum continues and investors begin to worry about "bad times" in Silicon Valley.