By James Langton

(December 22 – 12:30 ET) – Traders couldn’t bring themselves to play Grinch after all. At midday the TSE 300 is up 142 points to 8,742.

Volume is on the light side at 59.5 million shares, about three to two in favour of buyers. Advancers are edging decliners ten to nine.

Nine of the TSE’s 14 sub-indices are up at midday, led by the industrials, gaining 4%. Financials, paper and conglomerates are recording modest gains, too. Golds and miners are leading the downside, and most of the other moves are minimal.

Nortel Networks is powering the market higher today, gaining 5.3% on 2.3 million shares. General bargain hunting among the beaten down tech bellweathers seems to be the reason.

The buying mood has spread to names such as Janna, Research in Motion, Pivotal, JDS Uniphase, Ballard Power, Alcatel, Celestica and Exfo Electro.

One of the big tech wrecks today is Cognos. It’s down about 30% after it reported weaker than expected sales growth in its third quarter and cut its forecasts for fiscal 2002.

Air Canada is also taking a bit of a thumping, off 12%, after it warned that its fourth-quarter loss would be worse than expected.

In the financial sector, banks are powering their way higher on the shoulders of the techs. Insurers are the losers today, except Manulife Financial which is up after announcing that it will acquire Commercial Union’s Canadian life insurance business for an undisclosed price.

Among the mutual fund companies, Mackenzie is popping on the news that C.I. is abandoning is hostile bid for the firm. C.I. is flat. The other fund companies are generally up, too.

Another loser is Laidlaw Inc., which is recording a loss of more than $2 billion for its latest fiscal year, including $1.6 billion in writedowns.

In New York, trading momentum is up, in light volume. The Dow Jones industrial average has gained 118 points to 10,606. The Nasdaq composite index is up 161 points to 2,501. The S&P 500 has gained 27 points to 1,302.

The CDNX is the lonely loser today, down two points to 2,691 on another strong volume day with 28.3 million shares crossing the tape.

Techs are strong however, up 2%. Cantex Mine Development Corp is the top trader, down 24% to 13¢ on volume of 2.5 million shares.