Bank Stocks Slide After Profit Reports

Losses for several banks and Big Tech stocks pulled US indexes lower on Wednesday, even though most stocks on Wall Street rose.

• The S&P 500 fell 37.14 points, or 0.5%, to 6,926.60 for its second straight loss after setting its all-time high.
• The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 42.36 points, or 0.1%, to 49,149.63.
• The Nasdaq composite fell 238.12 points, or 1%, to 23,471.75.

Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Citigroup all dropped following their latest profit reports. Nvidia and other tech stocks that have caught criticism for having too-expensive stock prices were the heaviest weights on the market, the AP reports. Oil companies and stocks of smaller companies rallied, while Treasury yields eased in the bond market.

Wells Fargo helped pull the market lower after falling 4.6%. The San Francisco-based bank reported weaker profit and revenue for the latest quarter than expected, with analysts citing lower trading fees and other miscellaneous items. Bank of America fell 3.8% despite reporting a stronger profit than analysts expected, with some consternation about the size of its upcoming expenses. Citigroup, which is in the midst of a turnaround under Chair and CEO Jane Fraser, fell 3.3% following its own profit report.

• Biogen sank 5% after the biotechnology company said it expects to take a hit to its profit for the fourth quarter of 2025 due to research and development expenses and other costs that it acquired. The heaviest weights on the market were tech stocks, which gave back some of their huge gains made over recent years from the frenzy around artificial-intelligence technology. Nvidia fell 1.4%, and Broadcom sank 4.2%.

Still, more stocks rose on Wall Street than fell, and the strongest forces keeping the S&P 500 from steeper losses were Exxon Mobil and other oil companies. Exxon Mobil rose 2.9%, and Chevron climbed 2.1% as the price for a barrel of benchmark US oil rose 1.4% to settle at $62.02. Oil prices have rallied as protests have swept Iran, which is a member of the OPEC group that helps set crude prices. The protests could lead to disruptions in production and squeeze supplies of crude. Besides the rise in oil prices, gold's price rose 0.8% in another signal of nervousness across financial markets.

In the bond market, Treasury yields sank as investors sought investments seen as safer. Several reports on the US economy also came in mixed.

• One said that shoppers spent more at US retailers in November than economists expected. That could be an encouraging signal about the main engine of the US economy, but economists pointed to some concerning signals underneath the surface.
• A separate report said prices rose modestly at the US wholesale level in November. It followed a report on Tuesday that said inflation at the US consumer level was close last month to economists' expectations, though it remained above the Federal Reserve's 2% target.
• A third report said sales of occupied homes were stronger last month than economists expected. Taken together, the data did little to change Wall Street's expectation that the Federal Reserve will cut its main interest rate at least twice this year to shore up the job market, likely beginning around June, according to CME Group.