U.S. shares higher at close of trade; Dow Jones Industrial Average up 0.70%

Investing.com – U.S. equities were higher at the close on Wednesday, as gains in the , and sectors propelled shares higher.

At the close in NYSE, the gained 0.70%, while the index added 0.45%, and the index gained 0.09%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the were Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE:), which rose 3.08% or 7.70 points to trade at 257.79 at the close. JPMorgan Chase & Co (NYSE:) added 2.98% or 3.62 points to end at 125.30 and Walt Disney Company (NYSE:) was up 2.28% or 3.88 points to 174.33 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Salesforce.com Inc (NYSE:), which lost 0.96% or 2.23 points to trade at 228.94 in late trade. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:) declined 0.73% or 1.63 points to end at 222.31 and Cisco Systems Inc (NASDAQ:) shed 0.44% or 0.20 points to 44.49.

The top performers on the S&P 500 were Macy’s Inc (NYSE:) which rose 9.97% to 11.14, Diamondback Energy Inc (NASDAQ:) which was up 9.44% to settle at 48.21 and Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:) which gained 8.16% to close at 6.83.

The worst performers were International Flavors & Fragrances Inc (NYSE:) which was down 3.08% to 111.42 in late trade, MarketAxess Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:) which lost 2.64% to settle at 574.75 and PulteGroup Inc (NYSE:) which was down 2.18% to 44.42 at the close.

The top performers on the NASDAQ Composite were Yumanity Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:) which rose 1000.00% to 20.900, Ocugen, Inc (NASDAQ:) which was up 240.29% to settle at 2.7400 and Jaguar Health Inc (NASDAQ:) which gained 172.87% to close at 1.0800.

The worst performers were Cellectar Biosciences Inc (NASDAQ:) which was down 27.08% to 2.020 in late trade, Microvision Inc (NASDAQ:) which lost 27.18% to settle at 6.7500 and Aurora Mobile Ltd (NASDAQ:) which was down 19.83% to 3.840 at the close.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 2227 to 851 and 89 ended unchanged; on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, 1905 rose and 1079 declined, while 80 ended unchanged on the New York Stock Exchange.

The , which measures the implied volatility of S&P 500 options, was down 7.80% to 22.34.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.23% or 4.35 to $1874.65 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in February rose 2.30% or 1.08 to hit $48.10 a barrel, while the March Brent oil contract rose 2.01% or 1.01 to trade at $51.17 a barrel.

EUR/USD was up 0.13% to 1.2176, while USD/JPY fell 0.01% to 103.61.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.21% at 90.358.