Stocks opened with modest gains but were unable to hold them. The averages have drifted but have never been far from the flat line. The Nasdaq, the top performing index for 2017, is the laggard near noon with a mild loss, while the Dow and S&P are closer to unchanged. Even if today ends on a mild down note, 2017 was a very strong year for stocks, with the S&P 500 up 20% this year, the Dow up about 25% and the Nasdaq up 29%. ECONOMIC EVENTS: In the U.S., no economic data of note was reported. COMPANY NEWS: Shares of Amazon.com (AMZN) are fractionally lower after President Donald Trump tweeted critically about the company this morning, calling on the U.S. Postal Service to charge the online retailing giant “much more” for shipping. Meanwhile, Apple (AAPL) shares are also down about 0.5% after the company issued a public apology for the way it handled performance for iPhones with older batteries. The tech giant, which has been criticized for admitting to slowing down older iPhone models to keep them from shutting down due to battery issues, is reducing the price of an out-of-warranty iPhone battery replacement by $50, it also announced… Goldman Sachs (GS) reported that it estimates, based on currently available information, that the enactment of new federal tax legislation will result in a reduction of approximately $5B in the firm’s earnings for Q4 and year ending December 31, 2017. Approximately two-thirds of that is due to the repatriation tax, while the remainder includes the effects of the implementation of the territorial tax system and the remeasurement of U.S. deferred tax assets, the bank explained… Following a campaign led by activist investor Carl Icahn, SandRidge Energy (SD) announced it has abandoned plans to buy Bonanza Creek Energy (BCEI), as it foresaw that it would not get shareholder approval for the deal. MAJOR MOVERS: Among the notable gainers was TiVo (TIVO), which jumped 11% after TheStreet reported that it was told by a person familiar with the situation that the company has received “multiple” expressions of interest from private equity firms that have made takeover bids of “slightly more than $20 a share.” Among the noteworthy losers was Adtran (ADTN), which dropped 14% after the company lowered its guidance for its fourth and first quarters, citing a “merger-related review and slowdown in the spending at a domestic Tier 1 customer.” Also lower was Energous (WATT), which fell 15% after Andrew Left’s Citron Research said the company “has a history of deception and the recent FCC info is no different.” Left contended in his tweet that “Powercast at CES will expose why” the stock will trade down to $15 per share, which would be a significant pullback after the stock had closed near $31 per share on Thursday. INDEXES: Near midday, the Dow was down 13.65, or 0.05%, to 24,823.86, the Nasdaq was down 14.00, or 0.2%, to 6,936.16, and the S&P 500 was down 2.10, or 0.08%, to 2,685.44.