Tech stocks were higher Tuesday afternoon, with the State Street Technology Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLK) rising 0.8% and the State Street SPDR S&P Semiconductor ETF (XSD) up 1.6%.

The Philadelphia Semiconductor index climbed 2.2%.

In corporate news, Alphabet's (GOOGL) Google said Tuesday its Gemini for Government AI tool is debuting Agent Designer, which lets Department of Defense civilian and military personnel build their own agents to support unclassified work. Alphabet shares rose 0.6%.

Nvidia (NVDA) and Thinking Machines Lab said Tuesday they have formed a multiyear partnership to deploy at least one gigawatt of Nvidia Vera Rubin hardware. Nvidia gained 1.6%.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) lifted its full-year earnings outlook, while its bottom line in fiscal Q1 topped market estimates. Its shares were down 0.8%.