U.S. Stocks Little Changed As Fed Announcement Looms

With traders looking ahead to this afternoon’s announcement by the Federal Reserve, stocks are showing a lack of direction during trading on Wednesday. The major averages have spent the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line.

Currently, the major averages are narrowly mixed. While the Nasdaq is down 5.64 points or less than a tenth of a percent at 16,161.15, the S&P 500 is up 1.35 points or less than a tenth of a percent at 5,179.86 and the Dow is up 33.05 points or 0.1 percent at 39,143.81.

The choppy trading on Wall Street comes as traders seem reluctant to make significant moves ahead of the Fed’s highly anticipated monetary policy announcement this afternoon.

While the Fed is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged, traders will look to the accompanying statement and economic projections for clues about the outlook for rates.

CME Group’s FedWatch Tool is currently indicating a 99.0 percent chance the Fed will leave rates unchanged today and a 94.1 percent chance rates will remains unchanged in May.

The outlook for June is more mixed, however, with the FedWatch Tool indicating a 60.2 percent chance of a quarter point rate cut and a 36.1 percent chance of an extended pause.

Among individual stocks, shares of Riot Platforms (RIOT) have moved sharply higher after JPMorgan upgraded its rating on the bitcoin mining company’s stock to Overweight from Neutral.

Restaurant chain Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) has also surged after announcing its board has approved a 50-for-one split of its common stock.

Meanwhile, shares of Signet Jewelers (SIG) have plunged after the jewelry retailer reported better than expected fiscal fourth quarter earnings but provided disappointing revenue guidance for the current quarter.

Sector News

Most of the major sectors are showing only modest moves on the day, contributing to the lackluster performance by the broader markets.

Airline stocks are seeing some strength along with brokerage and gold stocks, while biotechnology and oil service stocks have moved to the downside.

Other Markets

In overseas trading, stock markets across the Asia-Pacific region moved mostly higher on Wednesday, with the Japanese markets closed for a holiday. China’s Shanghai Composite Index climbed by 0.6 percent, while South Korea’s Kospi jumped by 1.3 percent.

Meanwhile, the major European markets are turning in a mixed performance on the day. While the French CAC 40 Index is down by 0.6 percent, the U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index and the German DAX Index both up by 0.1 percent.

In the bond market, treasuries are slightly higher ahead of the Fed’s monetary policy announcement. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, is down by 1.0 basis point at 4.287 percent.

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