Investors in the US look to have started the Thanksgiving Day holiday a day early, as the major indices are little changed.
Economic data has not encouraged investors to push stocks on to new highs, with weekly jobless claims higher than expected and durable goods orders weaker than anticipated.
The Dow Jones index is down nine points at 17,807, but the S&P 500 is up a point at 2,068 and the NASDAQ Composite is nine points firmer at 4,767.
Corporate news is thin on the ground, with computers shifter Hewlett-Packard hogging most of the limelight after its fourth quarter trading update. Adjusted earnings per share of US$1.06 were bang in line with market expectations, but revenue of US$28.41bn was a bit shy of the US$28.76bn the market had been expecting.
Car rental firm Hertz was wanted after activist investor Carl Icahn raised his stake from 8.67% to 10.77%.
Film animation studio DreamWorks climbed after Morgan Stanley upgraded it to ‘overweight’ from ‘equal weight’.