The Dow Jones index fell 0.38% to 34,288.64 points, the tech-dominated Nasdaq fell 0.18% to 13,791.65 points and the S&P 500 0.20% to 4,446.82 points.

"Almost all participants believe that additional increases in federal funds rates should be in order," report the "minutes" of the June 14 meeting of the Federal Reserve's Monetary Committee (FOMC). This confirms what Fed Chairman Jerome Powell has repeatedly suggested to Congress recently.

"The minutes have revealed nothing new," Peter Cardillo of Spartan Capital told AFP. He noted, however, that central bank economists believed that a "moderate recession" was in the cards for the end of the year.

According to the analyst, Wall Street's lack of enthusiasm was more reflective of profit-taking as many stocks hit all-time highs on Monday during a session cut short by Independence Day on Tuesday.

This was the case for the number one retailer Walmart (-0.06% to 158.11 dollars), but also McDonald's (+0.70% to 296.89 dollars) or General Electric (+0.35% to 108.66 dollars).

Bond yields on 10-year Treasuries tightened sharply to a three-month high of 3.93%, which did little to weaken equity prices.

Another factor that kept the indexes slightly in the red was services activity in China slowed in June.

The Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) released by media group Caixin and S&P Global showed that China's services business slowed growth in June to one of the weakest pace of the year, the latest sign of the country's post-Covid recovery running out of steam.

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

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.

Rivian puts the turbo

On the side of values, the manufacturer of electric vehicles, Rivian, which had soared more than 17% in the last session Monday, gained 4.45% while the group reported a jump in its vehicle deliveries in the previous quarter that exceed the 11,000 expected by analysts.

Automaker General Motors closed 1.16 percent higher after reporting a 19 percent jump in car sales in the second quarter.

Vaccine maker Moderna gained 1.49 percent to $123.54. 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.

Express carrier UPS dropped 2% as wage negotiations stalled with the drivers' union, threatening a strike.

The stock of cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase slipped 1.98% after an analyst expressed doubts about the company's profitability as the US securities and markets authority, the SEC, sued the platform for non-compliance with regulations.

© 2023 AFP