Wednesday's Market Wrap: Dow And S&P Little Changed, Nasdaq Jumps On Apple's Results

The market continued its recent pattern of low volatility on Wednesday as the Dow and S&P finished with very minor losses while the Nasdaq jumped in the wake of a better-than-expected earnings report from Apple Inc. AAPL. Shares of the tech giant climbed 6.5 percent to $102.95.

The major news on the day was that the Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged and said in a statement after the July FOMC meeting that economic headwinds have diminished. This may signal another increase in rates is on the horizon.

LogMein Inc LOGM jumped 20 percent after the company reported strong earnings results and announced a merger. Shares of Twitter Inc TWTR fell more than 14 percent after the company's Q2 earnings results disappointed the Street.

Major Averages

The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost less than 2 points on the session and closed at 18,472.

The S&P 500 fell less than 3 points, or 0.12 percent, and closed just below 2,167.

The Nasdaq climbed around 30 points on the day, or 0.58 percent, and closed at 5,140.

Related Link: Beyond Earnings: 10 Stocks Moving In Wednesday's After-Hours Session

Durable Goods

Durable goods orders fell 4 percent in June, compared to a decline of 2.8 percent in the prior period. This was more than expected as the consensus was calling for a decline of 1 percent in durable orders. Excluding transportation, orders fell 0.5 percent compared to the consensus estimate of a gain of 0.2 percent.

Commodities

The commodity complex was weaker on Wednesday, continuing recent losses. The Bloomberg Commodity Index lost 0.71 percent.

NYMEX crude oil futures fell more than 2 percent to $42.00. Brent contracts lost a little more than 3 percent and were last trading at $43.49. Natural gas declined 1.50 percent to $2.67.

Precious metals traded higher on the day. At last check, gold futures were up $20.00, or 1.51 percent to $1,348.30. The SPDR Gold Trust ETF GLD added 1.61 percent and the closed the equities session at $128.03. Silver futures surged almost 4 percent to $20.43. The iShares Silver Trust ETF SLV closed up 3.80 percent to $19.37.

In the grains complex, corn and wheat were mixed. Corn futures added a little better than 1 percent to $3.4300 while wheat futures fell 0.06 percent to $4.1475. In soft commodities, cocoa was slightly positive while cotton futures fell a little more than a half percent.

Bonds

Treasury prices rallied after the FOMC rate decision. At the close of equities, the iShares Barclays 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF TLT had climbed 1.25 percent to $140.65, sending yields lower.

Treasury yields were as follows: The yield on the 2-Year Note was 0.73 percent. The 5-Year Note was yielding 1.10 percent. The 10-Year Note was last yielding 1.52 percent while the 30-Year Bond yield was 2.23 percent.

Currencies

The U.S. Dollar fell on the FOMC decision. The PowerShares DB US Dollar Index Bullish ETF UUP, which tracks the performance of the greenback versus a basket of foreign currencies, fell 0.40 percent to $25.03 on the day. The closely watched EUR/USD pair added 0.66 percent to 1.1059 euros.

Volatility & Volume

The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) shed 1.69 percent on Wednesday to 12.83. The VIX is currently trading near the bottom of its 52-week range of 10.88 to 53.29.

Volume was light on Wednesday with around 73 million shares of the SPDR S&P 500 ETF SPY trading hands versus a 3-month daily average of 98 million shares. Trading in the PowerShares QQQ Trust QQQ was close to average with around 23 million shares trading hands compared to a 3-month daily average of just over 25 million.

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Posted In: EarningsNewsSector ETFsBondsBroad U.S. Equity ETFsFuturesCommoditiesCurrency ETFsForexGlobalAfter-Hours CenterMarketsETFs
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