The markets traded mixed during the midday with the Dow rising 15 points to 11,585 on the final trading day of 2010. Nasdaq slipped 8 points to 2654.

On the upside

The National Association of Realtors reported yesterday that pending sales of previously owned homes climbed by a much larger than expected 3.5% in November to lift shares of homebuilders Standard Pacific (NYSE: SPF) and Hovnanian Enterprises (NYSE: HOV).

The Inflection Point listed Kemet (NYSE: KEM) as one of tens stocks with the potential to double in 2011.

Eiad Asbahi of Prescience Investment Group wrote that Active Power (NYSE: ACPW) has great upside potential.

On the downside

Seeking Alpha contributor Robert Weinstein wrote that Corinthian Colleges (Nasdaq: COCO) will be the most important stock to own in 2011 but the stock price fell.

Dell (Nasdaq: DELL) is expected to introduce a touchscreen tablet to compete against Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL) iPad at the Consumer Electronics Show next week but analysts do not expect any rivals to dethrone the iPad.

Investors locked in profits on Molycorp (NYSE: MCP), whose shares surged recently when China cut its rare earth metals exports.

In the broad market, advancing issues edged out decliners by a margin of nearly 2 to 1 on the NYSE while decliners outpaced advancers by nearly 10 to 9 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks eased a fraction to 789.