02:15 PM EDT, 08/14/2025 (MT Newswires) -- US benchmark equity indexes were mostly lower intraday as Wall Street parsed the latest producer prices report and comments by a Federal Reserve official.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.3% at 44,787.7 after midday Thursday, while the S&P 500 fell 0.1% to 6,460.8. The Nasdaq Composite was little changed at 21,709.6. On Wednesday, the S&P 500 and the technology-heavy Nasdaq closed at new record-high levels.

Among sectors, materials saw the biggest drop intraday Thursday, while communication services led the gainers.

In economic news, official data showed that US producer prices rose at the fastest pace in about three years in July, potentially fueling worries that tariffs could heat up inflationary pressures in the coming months.

The producer price index report follows Tuesday's data showing that consumer inflation in the world's largest economy slowed down last month on a sequential basis, with analysts saying earlier this week that businesses have yet to fully pass through tariff-related costs to consumers.

Trends from the PPI report are "a little difficult to ignore," BMO said Thursday. "This captures the costs at the producer level, which could theoretically flow through to the consumer, unless producers are willing to eat all of the costs (tariffs), which is doubtful."

The probability that the Fed will lower its benchmark lending rate by 25 basis point next month dropped to about 91% on Thursday from 94% Wednesday, while the odds of another pause rose to about 9% from zero, according to the CME FedWatch tool.

St. Louis Fed President Alberto Musalem said Thursday that "it's too early to say exactly what policy I will be able to support" at the September meeting, CNBC reported. A potential 50-basis-point rate reduction is "unsupported by the current state of the economy and the outlook," Musalem reportedly said.

Weekly applications for unemployment insurance in the US declined more than expected, government data showed, suggesting that the labor market remained strong.

"There is nothing in the latest week's jobless claims data to alter (the Fed's) view of the labor market or our call that the Fed will hold off on cutting rates until December," Oxford Economics said.

US Treasury yields were higher intraday, with the two-year rate rising 5.6 basis points to 3.74% and the 10-year rate gaining 4.9 basis point to 4.29%.

In company news, Tapestry (TPR) issued a full-year earnings outlook below the Street's estimates amid tariff-related impacts, even as the luxury fashion company's fiscal fourth-quarter results beat expectations. The company's shares slumped nearly 15%, the steepest decline on the S&P 500.

Deere (DE) was among the worst performers on the index, down 6.7%. The agricultural and construction equipment lowered the top end of its full-year profit outlook.

Texas Pacific Land ( TPL ) shares were up 4%, the top gainer on the S&P 500, after the company said it was launching a dual listing of its shares on the NYSE Texas.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil was up 1.9% at $63.81 a barrel intraday. "Oil prices edged higher ahead of the US-Russia summit on Ukraine, though gains were capped by expectations of rising global supply," D.A. Davidson said in a client note.

Gold was down 0.7% at $3,382.40 per troy ounce, while silver fell 1.5% to $38.03 per ounce.