Stocks are battling to a standstill this morning, as profit worriers and bargain hunters array themselves throughout the market.

At midday, the bulls hold a slight advantage, with the TSE 300 up four points to 6,843.

Volume is on the light side at 76 million shares, with sellers holding a nine to five edge on buyers. Losers also outnumber winners by about mine to seven.

Golds are down today, as are oils, paper stocks, conglomerates, media and merchandisers. Techs are largely shaking off Nortel’s latest warnings, and there are gains in miners, transports, utilities and financials.

Nortel may not be shaking the rest of the techs today, but it is trading heavily. At midday, it is down about 1.5% on 14 million shares, but the stock is up from earlier lows. Against Nortel’s news, JDS Uniphase, Celestica, Research in Motion, Cryptologic and Geac are all bouncing nicely. Creo is down though.

The other big story today is the breakup of CP. While the five components have been trading as separate entities on a when-issued basis, this is their first official day out of the nest. The big loser today is Fairmont Hotels, but there are big gains in CP itself, CP Ships and Fording.

The airline bailout, as it is, is boosting WestJet and failing Air Canada. The flagship airline is seeing double digit losses today, but WestJet is up almost 9% on the news that it will be getting a little help.

Among the financials, the banks are split, with Royal Bank up in active trading, TD flat, and Bank of Montreal down. The insurers are providing the real strength in the financial group, with some support among fund companies.

In New York, opening losses were quickly erased and stocks are powering higher at midday. The Dow Jones industrial average is up 75 points at midday to 9,026. The Nasdaq composite has gained 52 points to 1,544. The S&P 500 is up 10 ticks to 1,062.

The CDNX is the lone loser today, down two points to 2825. Volume is light at 11.2 million shares. Miners are the core weakness, down almost 1%. Techs are up a bit and oils are down. Masuparia Gold Corp is the top trader, up 9% to 12¢ to 535,000 shares.