Earnings continued to drive mixed results for stock prices on Wednesday, with the Dow Industrials off yet again and the Standard & Poor’s 500 as well as the NASDAQ enjoying another up day.
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Dow Jones Industrial Average: -0.25 percent to 16,373.34
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Standard & Poor’s 500 Index: +0.06 percent to 1,844.86
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NASDAQ Exchange: +0.41 percent to 4,243
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On the Dow:
Earnings continued to be a downer for some of the largest US companies, and on Wednesday it was IBM’s (IBM) turn. The blue chip tech stalwart reported a miss on revenue expectations for the fourth consecutive quarter, resulting in a sell-off that saw the company close 3 percent lower.
The world’s largest chip-manufacturer Intel (INTC) was off by about 1 percent by the end of the session after the company announced that it would be laying off about 5 percent of its current staff.
Boeing (BA) lent an air of dignity to the struggling benchmark, adding nearly 3 percent by the end of the session after receiving large orders for its 787 Dreamliner from China, as well as General Electric (GE) .
On the S&P 500:
It was a big day for independent oil & gas stocks, with gains of at least 3 percent for each of Anadarko Petroleum (APC) , who benefitted from David Einhorn’s announcement that his Greenlight Capital would be taking a position in the company, and was followed by Southwestern Energy (SWN) , Range Resources (RRC) , and WPX Energy (WPX) .
Major retailer Best Buy (BBY) posted a 6 percent gain on heavy trading, after weathering the previous week’s brutal sell-off.
On the NASDAQ:
Tech shares drove the NASDAQ throughout the day. While Facebook (FB) was nearly 2 percent with Intel in tow, a number of tech stocks made substantial gains throughout Wednesday trading, including Micron Technology (MU) , Apple (AAPL) , Nuance Communications (NUAN) , and Xilinx Inc. (XLNX) .
