Investing.com – U.S. equities were higher at the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Oil & Gas, Technology and Financials sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 2.21% to hit a new 1-month high, while the S&P 500 index added 2.66%, and the NASDAQ Composite index climbed 3.57%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Dow Jones Industrial Average were American Express Company (NYSE:AXP), which rose 8.99% or 7.93 points to trade at 96.12 at the close. Visa Inc Class A (NYSE:V) added 6.15% or 10.54 points to end at 181.79 and Boeing Co (NYSE:BA) was up 5.86% or 7.70 points to 139.00 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Walmart Inc (NYSE:WMT), which lost 3.44% or 4.40 points to trade at 123.60 in late trade. 3M Company (NYSE:MMM) declined 0.86% or 1.35 points to end at 156.26 and Nike Inc (NYSE:NKE) shed 0.82% or 0.73 points to 88.07.
The top performers on the S&P 500 were Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd (NYSE:NCLH) which rose 25.36% to 16.41, Noble Energy Inc (NASDAQ:NBL) which was up 23.31% to settle at 10.05 and Apache Corporation (NYSE:APA) which gained 22.31% to close at 13.05.
The worst performers were Hasbro Inc (NASDAQ:HAS) which was down 6.36% to 72.91 in late trade, Coty Inc (NYSE:COTY) which lost 6.02% to settle at 5.46 and SBA Communications Corp (NASDAQ:SBAC) which was down 4.53% to 291.47 at the close.
The top performers on the NASDAQ Composite were Capricor Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:CAPR) which rose 252.70% to 8.500, Penn Virginia Corporation (NASDAQ:PVAC) which was up 79.37% to settle at 7.91 and TherapeuticsMD Inc (NASDAQ:TXMD) which gained 78.01% to close at 1.760.
The worst performers were Creative Realities Inc (NASDAQ:CREX) which was down 35.05% to 2.650 in late trade, Martin Midstream Partners LP (NASDAQ:MMLP) which lost 16.24% to settle at 2.94 and Fangdd Network Group Ltd (NASDAQ:DUO) which was down 16.06% to 10.24 at the close.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 2567 to 355 and 21 ended unchanged; on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, 2173 rose and 510 declined, while 44 ended unchanged on the New York Stock Exchange.
The CBOE Volatility Index, which measures the implied volatility of S&P 500 options, was down 6.97% to 31.23 a new 1-month low.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for June delivery was up 0.41% or 7.05 to $1729.25 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in June rose 24.64% or 3.04 to hit $15.38 a barrel, while the July Brent oil contract rose 0.21% or 0.05 to trade at $24.27 a barrel.
EUR/USD was up 0.02% to 1.0875, while USD/JPY fell 0.09% to 106.61.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.38% at 99.555.