Stocks gave up an early gain and turned lower in the last half-hour of trading Wednesday, leaving major indexes with modest losses. The S&P 500 lost 0.2% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average gave up 0.4%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq held up somewhat better, ending down just 0.1%. Several stocks championed by hordes of online investors made more erratic moves, and several of them ended with sharp losses, the AP reports. Wendy’s sank 12.7% after soaring 25.9% a day earlier. Clover Health fell 23.6% while AMC Entertainment sank 10.4%. The original "meme" stock, GameStop, will report its quarterly results after the closing bell on Wednesday.
The company has tried to avoid its attachment to the online activist investor community as best as it can. Its last quarterly conference call with investors lasted 15 minutes and the company took zero questions. The tech-heavy Nasdaq was lifted by the same Big Tech companies that have pushed that index generally higher for the last 18 months. Microsoft rose 0.5% and Amazon added 0.6%. Investors will get closely watched US inflation data on Thursday and how it might impact ultra-low interest rates and other market-supporting policies. The market has been relatively constrained over the last several days and investors have parsed any data to judge whether rising inflation will be temporary, as the Federal Reserve thinks, or more permanent.
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