It was a mixed close for the markets with the Dow climbing 67 points to 17,073 as investors continued to monitor the Chinese economy. Nasdaq slipped 8 points to 4,708.

On the upside

Shares of EP Energy (NYSE: EPE) surged as crude oil prices climbed.

Peabody Energy (NYSE: BTU) eliminated an additional 15 jobs at its headquarters in St. Louis.

Bloomberg reported that Basic Energy Services (NYSE: BAS) was considering a counter bid to acquire DuPont.

On the downside

Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) will release its database software SQL Server for Linux next year.

Investors locked in profits on ConforMIS (Nasdaq: CFMS).

Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) Mac computers were targeted with ransomware.

In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 2 to 1 on the NYSE and by nearly 7 to 3 on Nasdaq. The broader S&P 500 added a point to 2,001. Bitcoin rose $3 to $413.