March 23 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks ended little changed as the biggest drop in oil prices this year sparked a recovery from an inflation report that reinforced the Federal Reserve's concern about increasing price pressures.

``Today's bounce is solely attributable to the fall in oil,'' said Scott Wren, senior equity strategist at A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc. in St. Louis. Investors ``overreacted'' to the Fed's comments, Wren said, ``We're not going to have a lot of inflation.''

Technology companies such as Intel Corp. advanced. The retreat in oil prompted investors to sell energy stocks, including Exxon Mobil Corp., and snap up semiconductor shares that have been some of the past year's worst performers.

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index added 0.82, or 0.1 percent, to 1172.53, rebounding from a seven-week low. The Nasdaq Composite Index, which gets two-fifths of its value from computer-related stocks, rose 0.88 to 1990.22.

Losses in Exxon weighed on the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which slipped 14.49, or 0.1 percent, at 10,456.02.

Almost three stocks declined for every one that gained on the New York Stock Exchange. Some 1.81 billion shares changed hands on the Big Board, 20 percent more than the three-month daily average.

Benchmark indexes fell to the day's lows in the first 90 minutes of trading in the wake of the consumer prices report and oil prices above $55 a barrel. The S&P 500 declined as much as 0.3 percent.

Stocks rebounded after an Energy Department report showed U.S. inventories of crude oil rose to the highest since July 2002 and pushed oil futures lower. Crude for May delivery dropped $2.22, or 4 percent, to $53.81 in New York.

The Labor Department said the consumer price index gained 0.4 percent in February, the most in four months. Core prices, which exclude food and energy, added 0.3 percent. The median economist forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey called for increases of 0.3 percent and 0.2 percent, respectively.

The Fed said yesterday that inflation pressures ``have picked up in recent months'' and announced the seventh quarter-point increase in its benchmark rate since June to 2.75 percent. The central bank also restated its plan to make future rate rises at a ``measured'' pace.

Near-record oil prices and higher rates have weighed on benchmark indexes this year. The S&P 500 has lost 3.3 percent in 2005, the Dow has dropped 3 percent and the Nasdaq has slumped 8.5 percent.

An index of semiconductor shares in the S&P 500 gained 1.5 percent today, trimming its 12-month decline to 12 percent. Intel, the world's biggest chipmaker, rose 37 cents to $23.39. Qualcomm Inc., the No. 2 maker of semiconductors that run mobile telephones, added 31 cents to $36.31.

Global stockpiles of chips will be ``completely cleared out'' early in the April-to-June period after falling 24 percent to $780 million, or four days' worth of stock, in the first quarter, ISuppli Corp. said in an e-mailed statement.

Applied Materials Inc., the world's biggest maker of semiconductor-production equipment, added 40 cents to $16.21. The company said it will start paying dividends and boost its stock buyback program to $4 billion to return cash to investors.

The slide in oil sent an index of energy companies down 1.7 percent for the steepest decline among the S&P 500's groups. Even after today's drop, the group has soared 45 percent in the past 12 months, more than double the gains of the next-best performers.

Exxon, the world's largest publicly traded oil company, fell 81 cents to $60.09. ChevronTexaco Corp. lost 75 cents to $58.42. ConocoPhillips, the No. 1 U.S. oil refiner, slid $1.93 to $105.10. They were among the four biggest drags on the S&P 500.

In other markets, the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index lost 26.90, or 0.5 percent, to 4910.40; France's CAC 40 Index dropped 14.77, or 0.4 percent, to 4032.41; Germany's DAX Index fell 3.49, or 0.1 percent, to 4317.20; and Japan's Nikkei 225 Stock Average declined 102.85, or 0.9 percent, to 11,739.12.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ari Levy in New York at alevy5@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: March 23, 2005 17:32 EST