Stocks retreat after hot October retail sales report

Stocks are mixed in the final hour of trading while the 10-year Treasury yield hit a 6-week low.

Video Transcript

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RACHELLE AKUFFO: Hello, and welcome to Yahoo Finance Live this Wednesday. I'm Rachelle Akuffo alongside Seana Smith. Let's kick things off with a market share heading into this final hour of trading. Let's get on the Interactive. We're seeing that the stronger than expected retail sales data really boosted the likelihood that the Fed would stay the course with the rate hikes as consumers continue to prop up the economy. We're seeing how that affected the major indices there.

Taking a look at the Dow, you see it's been a volatile day. Still relatively flat at the moment, but a volatile day, just up slightly, just 1/10 of a percent. Taking a look at the tech-heavy NASDAQ, taking a big hit there, down 1/3 of a-- 1 and 1/3 of a percent, and the S&P 500 down about just over half a percent.

Also want to take a look at what we're seeing in terms of the sector action as well because we're seeing that we're seeing a lot more movement into some of these more defensive plays. You're seeing utilities up there more than 1%. You're also seeing health that's been doing well as well. And in terms of defensive consumer staples, also up more than half a percent. Lagging the most, energy we see there, down just shy of 2% on the day, under some pressure there.

And also want to keep an eye on what we're seeing with the inversion curve, between the 2 and 10-year Treasury yields. Now we saw those widen after that retail announcement as the two-year is the most sensitive to Fed rate hikes. Now the two-year jumped above 4.4% before easing back and the 10-year fell to a more than one month low, just above 3.7%, and continues to hover around there at the moment.