Investing.com – U.S. equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Oil & Gas, Basic Materials and Healthcare sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 1.50%, while the S&P 500 index lost 1.11%, and the NASDAQ Composite index fell 0.78%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Dow Jones Industrial Average were United Technologies Corporation (NYSE:UTX), which rose 0.57% or 0.77 points to trade at 134.68 at the close. Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) fell 0.15% or 0.27 points to end at 178.12 and Visa Inc (NYSE:V) was down 0.38% or 0.47 points to 122.90 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Caterpillar Inc (NYSE:CAT), which lost 4.11% or 6.63 points to trade at 154.63 in late trade. DowDuPont Inc (NYSE:DWDP) declined 2.90% or 2.10 points to end at 70.26 and UnitedHealth Group Incorporated (NYSE:UNH) shed 2.76% or 6.42 points to 226.10.
The top performers on the S&P 500 were TJX Companies Inc (NYSE:TJX) which rose 6.83% to 82.59, Booking Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:BKNG) which was up 6.77% to settle at 2034.04 and Envision Healthcare Corp (NYSE:EVHC) which gained 4.71% to close at 38.47.
The worst performers were Albemarle Corporation (NYSE:ALB) which was down 9.90% to 100.52 in late trade, Celgene Corporation (NASDAQ:CELG) which lost 9.04% to settle at 87.12 and Chesapeake Energy Corporation (NYSE:CHK) which was down 8.01% to 2.815 at the close.
The top performers on the NASDAQ Composite were Endocyte Inc (NASDAQ:ECYT) which rose 41.19% to 5.930, Aytu BioScience Inc (NASDAQ:AYTU) which was up 30.80% to settle at 0.6409 and Axon Enterprise Inc (NASDAQ:AAXN) which gained 27.82% to close at 34.83.
The worst performers were Zosano Pharma Corp (NASDAQ:ZSAN) which was down 24.73% to 6.240 in late trade, Frontier Communications Corp (NASDAQ:FTR) which lost 23.92% to settle at 7.03 and ACADIA Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:ACAD) which was down 20.04% to 24.915 at the close.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 2240 to 886 and 40 ended unchanged; on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, 1830 fell and 701 advanced, while 117 ended unchanged on the New York Stock Exchange.
The CBOE Volatility Index, which measures the implied volatility of S&P 500 options, was up 7.75% to 20.03.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for April delivery was up 0.05% or 0.70 to $1319.30 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in April fell 2.25% or 1.42 to hit $61.59 a barrel, while the May Brent oil contract fell 2.74% or 1.82 to trade at $64.70 a barrel.
EUR/USD was down 0.28% to 1.2199, while USD/JPY fell 0.57% to 106.73.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.31% at 90.59.