(February 15 – 13:00 ET) – Markets popped on the open this morning. Strong results and bullish guidance from Ciena Corp. is setting the tone.

The TSE 300 is up 88 points to 8,999. Volume is average at about 76.2 million shares, about three to two in favour of buyers. Advancers outnumber decliners by a margin of about six to five.

With Ciena boosting tech sentiment industrials are up about 3.8%. There’s also notable strength in mines, but most of the other up moves are moderate. Five of the TSE’s sub-indices are down, led by the pipelines, financials and consumer stocks.

Nortel Networks is up about 5% on 5.9 million shares on renewed tech sector enthusiasm. Following along are techs such as JDS Uniphase, Janna, Research in Motion, PRI Automation, Ballard Power and NPS Allelix.

Also up are some old economy names such as Abitibi and Bombardier. Inco is up very sharply although there’s no news from the firm.

The downside is led by Sun Life which is off about 4.3% on heavy trading of 2.7 million shares. The firm announced strong results this morning, but also warned about lower results in the future and it announced the windup of its U.K. distribution business. TD Bank is down a little after announcing its first quarter results.

Mackenzie Financial is up 9¢ in active trading today, still slightly below its takeout price at $29.70.

There’s also weakness on the energy side. That’s hitting stocks such as Ensign, Northstar Energy, Precision Drilling and Burlington. Also weak are Open Text, Vivendi and Mosaid.

Breakup candidate CP is down almost 2% today and PanCanadian Petroleum is off, too.

In New York, stocks jumped at the open and have been floating around since then without much direction. The Dow Jones industrial average is up 96 points to 10,892.

The Nasdaq composite has has gained 82 points to 2,574. TheS&P 500 is up 12 points to 1,328. Earnings news later today from HP and Dell has some traders anticipating their calls. Dell is already confirming layoffs, though.

The CDNX is also, albeit just four points to 3,218. Volume is strong at 26.4 million shares. Techs are down, mines and oils are up. Genoil Inc continues to trade heavily, up 11% to 20¢ on more than 7.3 million shares traded.