U.S. stocks traded lower toward the end of trading, with the Nasdaq Composite falling around 1% on Wednesday.

The Dow traded down 0.16% to 44,778.55 while the NASDAQ fell 1% to 19,537.19. The S&P 500 also fell, dropping, 0.54% to 6,034.67.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Consumer staples shares surged by 0.7% on Wednesday.

In trading on Wednesday, information technology shares fell by 1.9%.

Top Headline

U.S. crude inventories climbed by 3.463 million barrels during the recent week, compared to market estimates of a 3.2 million-barrel gain, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Equities Trading UP

Signing Day Sports, Inc. ( SGN ) shares shot up 128% to $4.41. Signing Day Sports ( SGN ) executed a stock purchase agreement to acquire majority of capital stock of Swifty Global.

Shares of Ranpak Holdings Corp. ( PACK ) got a boost, surging 30% to $7.47 after the company announced it has agreed to issue warrants for up to 18.72 million shares.

Nextracker Inc. ( NXT ) shares were also up, gaining 20% to $47.37 as the company reported better-than-expected third-quarter financial results and raised its FY25 GAAP EPS guidance on Tuesday.

Equities Trading DOWN

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Limited ( TEVA ) shares dropped 13% to $18.78 following fourth-quarter financial results.

Shares of Manhattan Associates, Inc. ( MANH ) were down 24% to $224.87 following soft FY25 guidance.

Packaging Corporation of America ( PKG ) was down, falling 9% to $218.99 after the company reported mixed fourth-quarter financial results.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.5% to $72.62 while gold traded up 0.1% at $2,768.60.

Silver traded up 1.8% to $31.425 on Wednesday, while copper rose 0.8% to $4.2800.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly higher today. The eurozone's STOXX 600 rose 0.50%, Germany's DAX 40 gained 0.97% and France's CAC 40 fell 0.32%. Spain's IBEX 35 Index rose 1.09%, while London's FTSE 100 rose 0.28%.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed higher on Wednesday, with Japan's Nikkei 225 gaining 1.02% and India's BSE Sensex gaining 0.83%.

Economics

The U.S. trade deficit in goods increased to a record $122.11 billion in December versus a revised $103.5 billion gap in the prior month.

U.S. wholesale inventories declined by 0.5% month-over-month to $898 billion in December following a revised 0.1% fall in the previous month and versus market estimates of a 0.2% gain.

U.S. crude inventories climbed by 3.463 million barrels during the recent week, compared to market estimates of a 3.2 million-barrel gain, according to the Energy Information Administration.

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