Afternoon markets: Dow maintains lead after rocky start

The Dow Jones benchmark index in the US looked set to cap a week of gains, moving up 25.5 points to 9,812.34.

A broker upgrade on the earnings of technology stocks helped to support blue chips after a rocky start to the session as comments made by US Fed chief Ben Bernanke yesterday helped to unsettle investors already nervous about the economic outlook. Bernanke said that he would look to raise interest rates once the economic outlook had sufficiently improved. International Business Machines (IBM) topped the gainers, up 1.7% to $124.3, while PC maker Hewlett-Packard rose 1.3% to $47.06 and chip manufacturer Intel gained more than 1%. A mixed bag dominated the losers, with McDonalds falli...