Business news for Mon, 31 Dec 2007 & with words action+lower. 3 news.

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - Telecommunications stocks mostly edged lower on quiet Monday action, led by a 1% drop in Sprint Nextel Corp . Other notable decliners included Tellabs Inc. , Ciena Corp. and Juniper Networks Inc. , all down around 1% in the session before the New Year's holiday. Among the few gainers were Vonage Holding Corp. and Nortel Networks Corp. The two companies settled a patent dispute, although the agreement does not require payment from either side. Shares of Vonage were up 7% and Nortel rose 1.6%.

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Energy stocks drifted slightly lower at the open Monday, the final session of 2007, amid sharply lower volume. Early action saw shares of Delta Petroleum Corp. jump as much as 24% to $19.30 a share after Kirk Kerkorian's Tracinda Corp. announced it was taking a 35% stake in the company at $19 a share. But the news failed to spur gains elsewhere in the group. The Amex Oil Index was off 0.2% at 1,574 points, the Philadelphia Oil Service Index was down 1% at 303, and the Amex Natural Gas Index was essentially unchanged at 580 points.

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Gold futures saw a slight pullback while oil futures were steady in early action Monday. Gold for February delivery slipped $2.90 to $839.80 an ounce and oil futures for February delivery rose 5 cents to $96.05 a barrel.