Stocks traded mixed on Tuesday on the heels of a six-day streak of gains, after Johnson & Johnson's third-quarter sales disappointed investors and stirred doubts about the strength of the latest earnings season.

Investors are concentrating on corporate revenue figures, concerned that more large companies like Johnson & Johnson, while topping Wall Street's earnings consensus on one-time items, would post sales that reflected less spending by consumers.

The pharmaceutical giant and Dow component, fell 2.6 percent to $60.61.

J&J could be systematic of what we're up against, said Elliot Spar, market strategist at Stifel Nicolaus in Shrewsbury, New Jersey. If market players start to see that J&J is the norm, they're not going to wait around for the news before selling.

The Nasdaq was lifted by Cisco Systems Inc, up 1 percent after it agreed to buy Starent Networks Corp for $2.9 billion, or $35 per share.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> rose 3.47 points, or 0.04 percent to 9,889.27. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.SPX> dropped 1.67 points, or 0.16 percent, to 1,074.52. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.IXIC> rose 5.67 points, or 0.26 percent, to 2,144.79.

The S&P 500 managed a sixth consecutive day of gains on Monday to end at its closing high for the year as energy shares rose alongside the price of oil.

Stocks have risen so much that they've set themselves up for disappointment, Spar said. Unless companies post a blow-out quarter, there's no telling what they might do to the downside.

Intel Corp , a Dow component, and railroad operator CSX Corp are both scheduled to release results after the market closes on Tuesday. Ahead of the reports, Intel shares edged up 1 percent to $20.63 while CSX was down 1 percent to $4.18.

Shares of Goldman Sachs Group Inc fell 2.3 percent to $185.72 after influential banking analyst Meredith Whitney downgraded the stock to neutral from buy. Peer company Morgan Stanley was down 2.1 percent to $31.11.

RailAmerica Inc shares dropped 5.9 percent to $14.12 in their trading debut on Tuesday, after the company's $330 million initial public offering.

Also on Tuesday, Investor's Business Daily and TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence said their IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index slipped to 48.7 in October from 52.5 in September. Any reading below 50 indicates pessimism in consumer confidence.

(Editing by Padraic Cassidy)

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