The Dow Jones index gave up 0.36%, the Nasdaq which had started the session down was almost stable (-0.01%) and the broader S&P 500 index fell 0.14% around 14:00 GMT.

Markets had closed on Tuesday due to a public holiday. During a shortened session on Monday, the Dow Jones had nibbled 0.03% to 34,441 points, the Nasdaq index had gained 0.21% to 15,277.50 points and the broader S&P 500 index had gained 0.12% to 4,467.50 points.

"The negative trend has a macro-economic component and a geo-political component," said Patrick O'Hare of Briefing.com.

The analyst pointed to the Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) released by the media group Caixin and S&P Global, which showed that activity in services in China slowed its growth in June to experience one of the weakest pace of the year, the last sign of the post-Covid recovery in the country.

The index stood at 53.9 points last month, a slowdown from 57.1 in May.

A number below 50 indicates a contraction in activity. Beyond that, it indicates expansion.

The disappointing data comes amid a tense trade backdrop between Beijing and Washington, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that the Biden administration is preparing to restrict China's access to remote computing services (cloud).

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is scheduled to travel to China from Thursday to Sunday to meet with Chinese officials.

China's ambassador to the United States, Xie Feng, on Tuesday called on Beijing and Washington to "take a step towards each other" during the meeting with Yellen.

"We hope the United States and China will each take a step towards each other" and "take measures to remove obstacles and manage their differences so as to strengthen dialogue and cooperation," the diplomat said, according to Chinese broadcaster CCTV.

Relations between Beijing and Washington have notoriously deteriorated due in particular to disputes in trade against a backdrop of technological rivalry.

On the domestic front, investors will scrutinize the "minutes" of the mid-June monetary meeting of the US central bank where it had paused its rate hikes after ten consecutive hikes to curb inflation.

It is a question of detecting his intentions for the future, knowing that Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Fed, has indicated several times since that two other rate hikes were very possible.

In the bond market, ten-year yields were almost stable at 3.86%.

On the market, the manufacturer of electric vehicles, Rivian, which had soared more than 17% on Monday, gained 2.30% around 14:00 GMT while the group reported a jump in its vehicle deliveries in the previous quarter that exceed the 11,000 expected by analysts.

Tesla was also up (+0.57%).

Vaccine maker Moderna climbed 5.30% to $128.18. The U.S. laboratory has signed a memorandum of understanding with China to produce drugs for the Chinese market, he announced Wednesday. The investment could amount to a billion dollars, according to Chinese media.

Asked by AFP, Moderna - which has developed one of the very first messenger RNA vaccines against Covid-19 - did not confirm the amount of the investment. However, he said that a memorandum of understanding had been signed.

The express carrier UPS dropped more than 2% while wage negotiations stalled with the drivers' union, raising the threat of a strike.

The title of the cryptocurrency exchange platform Coinbase fell 2.65% after an analyst expressed doubts about the profitability of the company while the US authority of the financial markets, the SEC, sues the platform for non-compliance with regulations.

© 2023 AFP