Wall Street was lower on Wednesday as Brent crude slid back towards the 11-year low it hit last week and Apple weighed on all three major indexes. Crude oil gave up its gains from Tuesday after forecasts of a short winter in North America and Europe piled pressure on the oversupplied commodity. The S&P 500 energy sector led nine of the 10 major S&P sectors lower with a 1.14 percent decline. Shares of Exxon were down 0.8 percent at $78.56, while Chevron was down 1.2 percent at $90.11.
The energy sector has fallen 23.54 percent for the year, easily the worst performer on the index, followed by a 9.17 percent decline in materials, caused by a rout in commodities. Trading volumes are expected to remain thin on the last trading days of the year.
At 12:06 am ET (1606 GMT), the Dow Jones industrial average was down 31.42 points, or 0.18 percent, at 17,689.56, the S&P 500 was down 5.26 points, or 0.25 percent, at 2,073.1 and the Nasdaq Composite index was down 16.42 points, or 0.32 percent, at 5,091.52. Apple was the biggest drag on all three indexes, falling 1.3 percent to $107.31. Concerns about potentially soft iPhone sales have hit the stock in recent weeks.

Copyright Reuters, 2015

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