Stock market today: Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq diverge as jobs data, Trump’s Venezuela oil deal take focus

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LIVE Updated 12 mins ago

Rian Howlett , Karen Friar and Laura Bratton

Updated 2 min read

US stocks diverged on Wednesday as investors absorbed a promised deal to send Venezuelan oil to the US and digested fresh jobs data leading into the all-important monthly report.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) led gains, rising around 0.5%. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) gained roughly 0.2%, looking for its second consecutive record-high close. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) fell about 0.4%, pulling back slightly from its latest record with a break above the 50,000 level still in sight.

Wall Street is grappling with new Venezuela developments it largely brushed aside as stocks rallied to records. On Tuesday, President Trump said the country will relinquish and send up to 50 million barrels of its crude output to the US — valued at $2.8 billion. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright later said that the administration plans to indefinitely control Venezuela’s oil sales.

Crude prices fell to extend their early-year slump after the comments. West Texas Intermediate (CL=F) futures, the US benchmark, changed hands below $57 a barrel, while global benchmark Brent crude (BZ=F) slipped to trade around $60.

More broadly, attention is shifting to a packed slate of economic releases, with markets looking to an up-to-date health check as the flow of US data begins to normalize after recent disruptions.

Labor data took focus on Wednesday. ADP’s December update on private sector employment showed 41,000 jobs added in December, slightly missing expectations after business job creation essentially stalled in the final months of 2025.

Those releases set the stage for Friday’s December jobs report, which has taken on critical importance as investors view it as a key test of whether the economy is cooling enough to justify Federal Reserve policy changes in the months ahead. Investors also get a peek at November’s JOLTS data, showing the number of job openings in the market, as well as the number of Americans who quit or were laid off.

Meanwhile, the CES 2026 show continues to provide food for thought as heady promises from tech leaders clash with Wall Street expectations of what the sector can achieve. Discussion has centered on Nvidia (NVDA), as analysts diverge on whether the AI chipmaker is at the popping point of a bubble or at the beginning of a second sweltering run.

LIVE 17 updates

  • Oil prices fell in morning trading on Wednesday after Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the US will take over the sale of Venezuelan crude oil to the open market.

    Futures on West Texas Intermediate crude (CL=F), the US pricing benchmark, plunged by more than 1.6% to trade below $59.40 on the news. Futures on Brent crude (BZ=F), the international benchmark, fell by a tighter 0.8%, trading below $60.30.

    “We are going to market the crude coming out of Venezuela, first this backed up stored oil, and then infinitely going forward, we will sell the production that comes out of Venezuela into the marketplace,” Wright said Monday at a conference hosted by Goldman Sachs in Miami.

    Wright noted that this includes both oil currently stored in Venezuela and in barrels located on floating storage on the water.

    Wright also said that the US will supply the needed diluent chemicals, such as naphtha, that are necessary to liquify Venezuela’s heavy crude oil in order to transport it via pipelines. It is unclear whether he was referring to the US government itself or oil companies that produce naphtha as a byproduct of their drilling activity.

    Since the US government’s capture and extraction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over the weekend, President Trump has made several comments about his intent to reopen the floodgates on Venezuelan crude oil, largely shut off from the market since the country’s oil industry was nationalized in the early 2000s under Hugo Chavez.

    The president’s statements have included remarks that the US oil industry will spend “billions” of dollars to rebuild infrastructure that has largely been left to crumble for two decades. But to return Venezuela to its production highs of the early 2000s of around 3 million barrels per day would likely take around $180 billion in extra funding between now and 2040, according to energy intelligence firm Rystad Energy.

    Rystad estimates that international investors and operators would need to commit at least $30 billion to $35 billion of that capital within the next two to three years, and that more than $50 billion of investment would be needed over the next 15 years just to maintain Venezuela’s current output.

    The leaders of US majors Chevron (CVX), the only US company that has maintained operations in Venezuela since nationalization; ExxonMobil; and ConocoPhillips are expected to meet with the President on Friday to discuss potentially reentering Venezuela. However, it remains unclear whether those companies would be eager to quickly jump back into a politically tenuous environment where payoff is likely to be years down the line.

  • The ISM Services PMI in December hit 54.4% — marking its highest reading of the year and a third consecutive month of expansion in the services sector.

    Economists tracked by Bloomberg had expected the index to see a lower reading of 52.2% in December.

    ISM said the December Services PMI reading showed the sector, which employs the majority of Americans, ending the year on “a positive note,” even as businesses noted the impacts of tariffs and seasonality.

    Still, the services sector is continuing a longer-term deceleration. Case in point: In February 2022, ISM notes, the Services PMI was above 62%.

  • US job openings fell slightly to 7.1 million in November from 7.4 million in October, according to JOLTS data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics released Wednesday that had been delayed by the longest-ever federal government shutdown last fall.

    The 7.1 million openings in November were less than the 7.6 million projected by the economists tracked by Bloomberg.

    At the same time, the number of employees hired was little changed at 5.1 million for the month, as were the numbers of employees who quit their jobs, were laid off, or were discharged.

    BLS data in December had shown job openings ticking up by 7.67 million in October, exceeding economist expectations, but that figure was revised down to 7.4 million on Wednesday. The number of hires for October was also revised up to 5.4 million from an initial reading of 5.1 million. Monthly revisions to data result from additional reports received by the BLS from businesses and government agencies, and the bureau noted revisions to October data were larger than normal.

    Read more here.

  • Stocks took a breather at the market open on Wednesday after rallying to records during the previous trading session.

    The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) and the S&P 500 (^GSPC) dipped just below the flat line, following a record-high close for the latter. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) was also roughly flat after closing above 49,000 for the first time on Tuesday.

    Investors are digesting labor market data for December from private payroll processor ADP that gave signs of US employment stabilizing to end 2025. That data sets the stage for the Bureau of Labor Statistics’s release of the delayed November Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey at 10 a.m. — a broader look at the labor market.

  • Samsung Electronics’ (005930.KS) stock closed 2% up on Wednesday after announcing that it would acquire $1.73 billion worth of its own shares to compensate its employees and executives.

    News was also released by the local South Korean paper Korea Economic Daily, that US chip company Qualcomm (QCOM) is in talks with Samsung on chip production. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon was quoted by Korea Economic Daily as saying that the US company is currently in talks with Samsung, alongside several other companies, about contract manufacturing using the latest two-nanometre process.

    Finally, a stock rally, which has already added $350 billion in market value for Samsung, still has room to run, according to analysts.

    Bloomberg News reports:

    Read more here.

  • ADP’s national employment report showed the US economy added 41,000 private jobs in December, the company reported on Wednesday. Economists were expecting job gains of 50,000 from the report.

    “Small establishments recovered from November job losses with positive end-of-year hiring, even as large employers pulled back,” ADP’s chief economist Nela Richardson said in a statement.

    Annual pay increased 4.4%, which was unchanged from November, according to the report. Services jobs in healthcare and education continued to lead the job growth, while the largest declines were seen in professional and business services jobs.

    ADP’s report sets the stage for the December jobs report, which is scheduled for release on Friday. Economists expect to see a gradual slowdown in hiring, with job gains expected to grow by 55,000 in the final month of the year, less than November’s additions. The unemployment rate is expected to tick down 0.1% to 4.5%.

    Crucially, Friday’s jobs report marks a return to normal data reporting following the government shutdown, which skewed economic data and their release dates.

    Read more here.

  • Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) again rejected a takeover offer from Paramount Skydance (PSKY), telling shareholders that the offer “remains inferior” to Netflix’s (NFLX) $72 billion merger agreement.

    According to Bloomberg, on Dec. 22, Paramount reiterated an offer to buy shares at $30 each, with billionaire Larry Ellison — the father of Paramount CEO David Ellison — personally guaranteeing $40.4 billion in equity financing. Paramount also included a higher break-up fee.

    But Warner Bros. urged shareholders to rebuff the hostile takeover bid, citing the large amount of borrowing required for the deal.

    “Paramount’s offer continues to provide insufficient value, including terms such as an extraordinary amount of debt financing that create risks to close and lack of protections for our shareholders if a transaction is not completed,” Warner Bros. Discovery board chair Samuel Di Piazza Jr. wrote in a statement.

    Warner Bros. stock fell 0.5% in premarket trading, while Paramount and Netflix shares edged up about 0.3%.

    Read more: 5 questions for Netflix subscribers about the Warner Bros. deal

  • Optimism about the US economy has been tempered at America’s midsize businesses.

    According a new JPMorgan Chase survey released Wednesday, just 39% of leaders at midsize US firms said they are optimistic about the national economy in 2026. That’s down sharply from 65% a year earlier, when sentiment for the US economy stood at a five-year high.

    Yahoo Finance’s David Hollerith reports:

    Read more here.

  • Everything is a subscription now, even humanoid robots, argues Yahoo Finance’s Hamza Shaban.

    Look at Hyundai (HYMLF, 005380.KS), which plans to build thousands of robots within a couple of years, putting Tesla (TSLA) right in its sights. It’s pushing a model where customers don’t even own the machines.

    Hamza writes:

    Read more here in the takeaway from today’s Morning Brief.

  • Crude futures dropped on Wednesday after President Trump said that Venezuela has agreed to relinquish millions of barrels of supply to the US.

    Brent (BZ=F) was down 0.3%, or 18 cents, at $60.52 a barrel at 7:30 am ET, paring deeper losses from earlier in the morning. West Texas Intermediate (CL=F) fell 0.6%, or 34 cents, to $56.79.

    Both benchmarks were extending a slide of more than $1 on Monday, as investors reassessed rising geopolitical risks amid US tensions with China over trade, Europe over Greenland, and its ouster of Venezuela’s leader in a military operation.

    The new US export deal with Venezuela is seen as a move by Washington to take greater control over the country’s oil industry, which Trump has vowed to rebuild with the help of US energy majors.

    On Tuesday, Trump said Venezuela will relinquish as many as 50 million barrels of oil — worth as much as $2.8 billion, per Bloomberg.

    “I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social.

    “This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” he wrote.

  • GameStop (GME) stock rose 3% before the bell after it was announced that CEO Ryan Cohen’s compensation package would depend on the company hitting a $100 billion market cap goal.

    Deckers Outdoor (DECK) stock fell 4% after reporting better-than-expected results for its second quarter results on Tuesday. But the company said it continued to expect tariff pressures.

    First Solar (FSLR) stock edged lower on Wednesday following a Jefferies downgrade to Hold from Buy and a reduction in price target of $260, down from $269.

  • Strategy (MSTR) stock rose 3% before the bell on Wednesday, as MSCI did not proceed with a proposal to exclude digital asset treasury companies from its indexes.

    Reuters reports:

    Read more here.

  • Mobileye (MBLY) stock jumped 11% premarket on Wednesday after the company announced on Tuesday that it would be purchasing the humanoid robotics startup Mantee Robotics for $900 million.

    Reuters reports:

    Read more here.

  • Bloomberg reports:

    Goldman Sachs projects that Chinese stock benchmarks will post another year of growth, though at a slower pace than in 2025, with earnings supported by AI and policy measures.

    The MSCI China Index is forecast to climb 20% to 100 by end-2026 from its 2025 close, while the CSI 300 Index (000300.SS) is seen rising 12% to 5,200, strategists including Kinger Lau wrote in a note Wednesday.

    “Our expected equity gains in 2026 are almost entirely earnings-driven,” they said. Profit growth will be “supported by AI, ‘Going Global,’ and anti-involution policy.”

    China’s equity rally has carried strong momentum into the new year, and Goldman Sachs joins other major firms in maintaining a positive outlook despite hefty gains in 2025. The upgrade reflects confidence that earnings expansion, policy initiatives, and new growth drivers will keep investors engaged.

    Read more here.

  • Bloomberg reports:

    Read more here.

  • Bloomberg reports:

    Read more here.

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