NYSE Stocks Relax After Positive Week.(B)

Byline: KEN HOOVER

With a shortened day and little news, plus with many traders extending their holiday weekend, it was a sleepy day on the New York Stock Exchange. The Dow fell 0.4% and the S&P 500 dropped 0.3%. Volume contracted by more than half, with the market closing at 1 p.m. Eastern time.

Still, it was, on balance, a positive day, with slightly more advances than declines and no disaster stocks to be found.

Pre-Paid Legal Services was the star of the day, surging 2.02 to 28.65. It broke out of a 30-week base on 2 1/2 times its normal volume.

The company, which markets legal services that clients pay for in advance, has been the target of bearish attacks. Short interest in the stock represents 30.2 days of average volume, and the bears were sweating hard as the stock rocketed up in recent weeks, forming the right side of a base. The company's earnings rose 91% and 31% the past two quarters, and it has an Earnings Per Share Rating of 97.

Trex, which broke out of a pretty, 19-week base at 25 on Nov. 21, then moved up to nearly 30 on rising volume, pulled back, down 0.90 to 32.85.

The stock closed 5% below its high, set Wednesday. Trex makes material for backyard decks. Friday was the stock's first day down ...