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By Alex Veiga The Associated Press A late rise saved the stock market from a third straight day of losses. The push was enough to nudge the Standard & Poor's 500 index into the green by half a point Wednesday, as investors bought up oil refiners, min - ing companies and technol- ogy stocks. Refiners such as Tesoro Corp. led the gains. Stocks were down for most of the day, but began to crawl back in the after - noon. The three major U.S. stock indexes are still down for the week. Investors have been worried about a sharp drop in China's exports re - ported over the weekend, which raised concerns that the world's second-largest economy is slowing. Since China is a big consumer of raw materials and energy, commodities such as copper and iron ore have dropped sharply. The S&P 500 in - dex ended lower Monday and Tuesday. Some strategist say in- vestors are pausing after the market hit three record highs last week. "When markets reach these kind of new highs very often they have to di - gest those gains, which is what they're doing," said Quincy Krosby, a market strategist with Prudential Financial. "They need to ad - just the gains and then wait for the next catalyst to move higher." That could come to - day, when new data on re- tail sales and weekly unem- ployment benefit applica- tions are released. Among the big winners Wednesday was Tesoro. It rose the most of any stock in the S&P 500 index, climb - ing $2.13, or 4.1 percent, to $54.50. Marathon Petro- leum Corp., added $3.21, or 3.5 percent, to $94.50, while Valero Energy Corp., gained $1.62, or 3 percent, to $55.29. Investors also took a shine to mining companies as metals prices increased. Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. rose 43 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $18.41 and New - mont Mining Corp. rose 66 cents, or 2.7 percent, to $25.01. Tech giants Google, Mi - crosoft and Facebook also contributed to the day's gains. Together they make up about 12 percent of the Nasdaq composite. Google rose $7.31, or 0.6 percent, to $1, 207.30; Microsoft added 25 cents, or 0.7 per - cent, to $38.27 and Face- book climbed 78 cents, or 1.1 percent, to $70.88. WAll Street Stocks finish mostly higher D Dow Jones 16,340.08 -11.17 U S&P 500 1868.20 +0.57 U Nasdaq 4323.33 +16.14 By David espo The Associated Press WASHINGtON » The CIA's di- rector and its top lawyer told White House attorneys in advance about their plans to file an official criminal com - plaint accusing Senate In- telligence Committee aides of improperly obtaining se- cret agency documents, the White House conf irmed Wednesday. Lawyers in the White House Counsel's office did not approve the CIA's move to refer its complaint to the Justice Department or provide any advice to the agency, presidential spokes - man Jay Carney said. "There was no comment, there was no weighing in, there was no judgment," Carney said, citing protocol not to interfere in the ongo - ing inquiries into the matter by the FBI and the CIA's in- spector general. Ca r ney d id not say whether President Barack Obama was directly aware of the decision. "The president has been aware in general about the protocols and the discussions and occasional disputes involved," he said. Obama avoided comment - ing on his involvement in the dispute at the end of a meet- ing with female Democratic lawmakers on women's eco- nomic issues. He added that "with respect to the issues that are going back and forth between the Senate commit - tee and the CIA, (CIA Direc- tor) John Brennan has re- ferred them to the appro- priate authorities. And they are looking into it. And that's not something that is an ap- propriate role for me and the White House to weigh into at this point." Carney's confirmation of the White House's aware - ness of the CIA's decision deepens the complicated chronology that led the com- mittee head to denounce the CIA and top officials Tues- day for allegedly trying to intimidate and monitor con- gressional overseers. Sen. Dianne Feinstein's committee has been inves- tigating the CIA's now-shut- tered "black site" overseas prison system and harsh interrogation of prisoners. The committee's long-over - due report has been sty- mied by its inability to re- view a classified CIA report on the George W. Bush-era interrogations, while CIA officials have questioned whether Senate investiga - tors breached a classified computer system in efforts to press for the material. Carney said Brennan and the acting general counsel, Robert Eatinger, informed White House officials about the decision to make a re - ferral to the Justice Depart- ment. INVeStIGAtION Wh it e Ho us e to ld o f CI A move against Senate aides Thursday, March 13, 2014 rEdBLuFFdaILyNEWs.cOM | NEWS | 5 B