Markets are heading cautiously higher today. At midday, the TSE 300 is up 61 points to 6,723.

Volume is average at 78.6 million shares, with sellers holding a small edge on buyers. The split between winners and losers is about dead even.

On a sector basis, most groups are moving up modestly off earlier lows. Energy stocks and conglomerates are sliding along with oil prices. Everything else is up. Techs and biotechs are strong, as are media, merchandisers and financials.

The top trader remains Anderson Exploration, which is down a bit. Canadian Pacific is sliding, too, along with Husky Energy and Baytex Energy. Other losers include CP Rail, Fairmont Hotels, Telus, Geac, Descartes Systems and Tesco.

Geac and Descartes are sliding against a tide of strength in the beaten down tech sector. Nortel Networks is up 5% today, along with gains in JDS Uniphase, Celestica and Angiotech. There is also a recovering trend in stocks such as BCE, Westcoast Energy, Bombardier, Trizec Hahn and SNC Lavalin.

Insurers are notably higher today, off recent lows. CIBC is leading the banks higher, too.

Among the golds, Placer Dome is up in heavy trading, as traders hang on to safety, too.

In business news, Vivendi Universal is buying back 33 million shares. Royal Bank reports that it intends to redeem all of its issued and outstanding non-cumulative first preferred shares Series I for cash.

Bowater is cutting third quarter newsprint production by another 40,000 metric tons, for a total of 120,000 metric tons for the quarter. As a result, Bowater expects a loss for the third quarter of approximately 22¢ to 32¢ per share before the effect of currency changes. This estimate does not include the impact of the acquisition of Alliance Forest Products Inc. “The severe reduction in newspaper advertising has not abated, and we expect it to continue for the foreseeable future,” said Bowater CEO, Arnold Nemirow,

Also, Cognicase says that it has closed the deal to acquire all the issued and outstanding shares of Ezenet. The transaction is valued at approximately $54 million. Ezenet is a Toronto-based software developer that provides next-generation wealth management transaction processing and Web-based utilities for financial institutions.

In New York, cautious early strength is dissipating at midday in the absence of confirming positive news. The Dow Jones industrial average is down 27 points to 8,578. The Nasdaq composite index is off two points to 1,497. The S&P 500 is up three points to 1,007.

Canada’s venture capital stocks are weak, too. The CDNX is down seven points to 2,781. Volume is light at 10.6 million shares.

Techs are up today, but oils are down and miners are flat to down. The top trader is Dura Products International, up 36% to 19¢ on 566,000 shares.