As traders processed hawkish remarks made by Federal Reserve officials at their most recent meeting, pressure on US equities and Treasuries increased in the last minutes of Wednesday's session.
With worries that the central bank will keep raising interest rates, the S&P 500 fell 0.8%, stalling for the second straight day. The Nasdaq 100 fell 2.2% over a two-day losing streak as tech giants including Tesla, Amazon, and Meta Platforms weighed on the stock market benchmarks.
The recent declines in the stock market are also the result of technical reasons. After a surge of trade in zero-day options helped bring the index below the trendline for the first time since March at the end of the previous session, the S&P 500 finished below its average price over the previous 50 days for a second day.
In the afternoon session, US Treasury yields increased as the 10-year rate approached 4.3%. The benchmark bond's yields earlier this week got close to levels last seen in October. The two-year yield on the policy-sensitive note approached 5%.
