US Equity Indexes Fall in Midday Trading After Higher Producer Prices

01:42 PM EDT, 03/18/2026 (MT Newswires) -- US equity indexes fell in midday trading Wednesday after US producer prices rose more than expected in February.

The Nasdaq Composite fell 0.7% to 22,326.3, with the S&P 500 down 0.7% to 6,669.3 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average 1% lower to 46,544.5. Most US sectors were in the red, with consumer staples and health sectors leading the decliners.

US Treasury yields rose, with the 10-year yield up 3 basis points to 4.23%. The two-year yield gained 4 basis points to 3.72%.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures rose 1.4% to $96.91.

In economic news, the producer price index for final demand increased 0.7% in February, up from 0.5% in January, and above the 0.3% gain forecast by analysts polled by Bloomberg. Core PPI, which excludes food and energy prices, increased 0.5% in February, slower than 0.8% in the previous month, but faster than the 0.3% expected in a Bloomberg survey.

The index for final demand goods advanced 1.1%, the largest gain since August 2023. More than 20% of the increase in February is attributable to a 48.9% increase in prices for fresh and dry vegetables.

For the week ending March 13, US mortgage applications fell 10.9%, compared with a 3.2% growth in the previous week, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).

"Mortgage rates continued to move higher, driven by increasing Treasury yields as the conflict in the Middle East kept oil prices elevated, along with the risk of a broader inflationary shock." said Joel Kan, MBA vice president and deputy chief economist. "Rates were around 20 basis points higher than they were two weeks ago and this caused a reversal in refinance activity, particularly for conventional refinance applications, which decreased 27% over the week."

New orders for US factory goods rose by 0.1% in January, in-line with a survey compiled by Bloomberg, after a revised 0.4% decrease in December. Nondurable goods new orders increased 0.3%, compared with a 0.1% increase in the previous month.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, US commercial crude oil inventories for the week ended March 13 rose by nearly 6.2 million barrels, compared with 3.8 million increase in the previous week.

Crude oil inventories, including the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, stood at 864.7 million barrels, 3.8% higher than a year ago.

In company news, Coupang (CPNG) said late Tuesday it created an AI factory with Nvidia (NVDA) to support its ecommerce logistics and delivery services. Under the partnership, Coupang's (CPNG) Intelligent Cloud system will integrate with Nvidia's (NVDA) DGX SuperPOD to form a self-service AI ecosystem. Coupang (CPNG) shares were down 2.7%, while Nvidia (NVDA) shares were up 0.3%.

Alibaba's (BABA) cloud unit said Wednesday it will raise prices for select AI compute and storage services starting April 18 due to rising global demand and hardware expenses. Alibaba (BABA) shares shed 0.7%.

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