Wall Street suffers sharpest decline in nearly a month

Business Dec 18, 2025

Stocks took a noticeable hit on Wednesday, with the S&P 500 seeing its biggest drop in weeks—down 1.2%.
The Dow and Nasdaq also closed lower, as tech and AI-focused companies led the slide.

What's behind the drop?

Big AI names like NVIDIA, Broadcom, Oracle, and CoreWeave all fell sharply.
Even utilities that once benefited from data center demand weren't spared.
Investors are getting nervous about whether heavy spending on AI will actually pay off soon—only 17% of large firms have really scaled up their AI projects so far.

Anything going up?

Oil stocks bucked the trend thanks to US moves affecting Venezuelan tankers, which pushed crude prices higher.
That gave a boost to companies like ConocoPhillips and Devon Energy—even as most of the market struggled.