YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: The Nasdaq logged a modest gain as biotech stocks advanced in the face of broader market selling pressure, which kept the Dow and S&P 500 in the red for the entire session.

Coming off of a gain of more than 2% last week, participants moved against stocks in broad fashion. Of the 10 major sectors in the S&P 500, health care was the only one to sport a steady gain for the vast majority of the session. It finished 0.7% higher as biotechs climbed 2.4%.

Biotechs were also primary leaders in the Nasdaq Composite and the Nasdaq 100, where large-cap technology typically determines the direction of trade. Tech stocks finished fractionally higher, but Dell (DELL 16.01, -0.68) was dropped for a sizable loss. It announced that it will acquire Perot Systems (PER 29.56, +11.65) for $3.9 billion, or $30 per share in cash, which represents a near 70% premium to the closing price of PER last Friday.

This session's losses were steepest among financials, energy stocks, and materials stocks. All three shed 0.9%. Financials fell as consumer finance stocks (-2.5%) and life and health insurers (-2.1%) faltered, but energy and materials stocks were pressured by falling natural resource prices.

Oil futures prices dropped 3.2% to $69.71 per barrel, while natural gas fell 5.4% to $3.57 per contract. Gold prices finished 0.5% lower at $1004.90 per ounce, while silver prices settled 1.1% lower at $16.88 per ounce. Their collective weakness took the CRB Commodity Index down 2.2%, which is its worst single-session percentage loss in more than one month.

A rebounding U.S. dollar, which lifted the Dollar Index to a 0.5% gain, only emboldened the desire of participants to dump commodities.

For the fifth consecutive month, the Leading Indicators Index posted positive growth. However, the 0.6% increase for August was slightly less than the 0.7% increase that was widely expected and was also down from the upwardly revised 0.9% increase that was registered in July. There wasn't much importance placed on the report since it has done a poor job in past recessionary cycles of predicting the shape of economic recovery.DJ30 -41.34 NASDAQ +5.18 NQ100 +0.4% R2K -0.3% SP400 -0.3% SP500 -3.64 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1243/2.41 bln/1430 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1010/1.20 bln/2003