Stocks Trade Lower on Wall Street After Three Straight Days of Gains

However, he added: “What happens after the Fed rate hike is hard to tell, especially since we’re coming into a quiet period around Christmas and New Year”.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 253.25 points, or 1.43 percent, to 17,495.84, the S&P 500 lost 31.18 points, or 1.5 percent, to 2,041.89 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 68.58 points, or 1.35 percent, to 5,002.55.

The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index closed up 1.3 percent after climbing to a one-week high, while Germany’s DAX, France’s CAC and Britain’s FTSE 100 rose between 2.6 and 0.7 percent.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 index jumped 29.66 points, or 1.5 per cent, to 2,073.07. Gains were led by financial services as banks will benefit from a hike in borrowing rates.

Energy stocks were poised to weigh on the markets again, with shares of Transocean Ltd. (RIG) off 1.3% premarket and Exxon Mobil Corp.

Activists with the Center for Popular Democracy protest a likely increase in the interest rate by the Federal Reserve in front of the Federal Reserve headquarters in New York, Dec. 15, 2015.

Wall Street moved higher, though pared some of its earlier gains because oil slid, as investors anticipated a decision by US Federal Reserve policy makers to increase their target interest rate for the first time in almost …

The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of other major currencies, shed 0.06 per cent at 98.157.

However, the crude gains were short-lived and prices resumed their downtrend in Asian trade Wednesday, with buying dampened by data indicating United States stockpiles rose last week. Japan’s Nikkei gaining 484.01 points, or 2.61 percent, to 19,050.

The S&P is up 14.17 points, or 0.7 per cent.

“Manufacturing Flash PMIs beat consensus across Europe this morning, which probably did put some folks in a good mood”, Stephen Guilfoyle, managing director of floor operations at the New York Stock Exchange, said in his emailed Wednesday morning commentary.