Stocks - Wall Street in the Red Ahead of Fed Decision

Investing.com - Wall Street slipped lower at the open on Wednesday as investors waited for the Federal Reserve’s latest interest rate decision later in the trading day.

The Dow fell 68 points or 0.2% by 9:37 AM ET while the S&P 500 lost 8 points or 0.2% and the Nasdaq composite was also down 0.2%.

The Fed's policy statement is due at 2:00 PM ET followed by Chair Jerome Powell's press conference thirty minutes later.

The Fed is expected to cut interest rates by 25 basis points despite some strong economic data in recent days, which caused investors to pare back rate cut expectations.

Investors will also wait for clues on how far the U.S. monetary policy easing could go, given that Fed policymakers are divided on whether more rate cuts are warranted, and given the still-high level of uncertainty around the U.S.'s trade dispute with China, which Powell has identified as one of the biggest drags on the economy at present.

FedEx (NYSE:FDX) was among the biggest losers, falling more than 12% after reporting a fall in operating income in its fiscal first quarter and cutting its guidance for the rest of the fiscal year - a result of a weakening macro backdrop and the end of its contract with Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN).

United Parcel Service (NYSE:UPS) fell 2.6% in sympathy with its logistics rival.

Shares in Adobe Systems (NASDAQ:ADBE) fell 3.5% after it issued weaker-than-expected guidance in a third-quarter update that otherwise beat expectations.

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) shares fell 1.6% after reporting a decline in organic net sales in its fiscal first quarter, despite a beat on profits.

The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was down 0.1% to 97.92 and gold futures were little changed at $1,513.75 a troy ounce.

Meanwhile, crude oil was down 1.4% after U.S. President Donald Trump said on Twitter that he had approved increased sanctions on Iran following weekend attacks on Saudi Arabian oil installations.

That had only a muted effect on oil company stocks, sending Exxon Mobil (NYSE:XOM) down 0.6% and Apache (NYSE:APA) Corp. down 0.4%.

--Reuters contributed to this report

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