Around 2:55 p.m. GMT, the Dow Jones lost 0.16%, the Nasdaq index dropped 0.73% and the broader S&P 500 index lost 0.45%.

"The market is trying to interpret (Jerome) Powell's comments," said LBBW's Karl Haeling.

On Tuesday, the Fed chairman raised the possibility of raising rates even more than expected if macroeconomic data continued to surprise on the rise, like the 517,000 jobs created in January in the United States.

He also ruled out a year-end rate cut as the Fed expects inflation to remain significantly above the 2% annual target through 2024.

Jerome Powell "was in the same register as after the Fed meeting" a week ago, estimated Karl Haeling, which aroused "relief" among investors, reassured that "he did not have didn't take the opportunity to be more offensive".

Even if the indices opened in the red, "it seems that there is a dynamic in place", likely to maintain the bullish movement which has carried the New York place since the beginning of the year, according to the analyst.

"Investors have few stocks and want to increase their exposure."

On the side, Microsoft (+ 1.45%) continued to surf on its announcements of the day before, with the integration of the ChatGPT conversational robot into its Bing search engine and, more broadly, the strengthening of the use of artificial intelligence for all of its software and platforms.

The revitalization of Bing weighed on Alphabet (-6.03%), whose search engine, under the Google banner, outrageously dominates the market.

The group was to present its artificial intelligence (AI) projects on Wednesday, after unveiling its own conversational robot, called Bard, on Monday.

The battle of artificial intelligence benefits Nvidia (+ 1.84%), which notably manufactures servers intended for AI.

Wall Street hailed Uber's results (+2.89%), above its expectations.

The vehicle-with-driver (VTC) booking platform saw its activity accelerate in the last quarter and improved its margins in all its activities.

The English football club Manchester United (+13.52%), listed in New York, was gaining ground after several British media reported that the Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani could soon make a takeover offer.

The video game publisher Activision Blizzard suffered from the conclusions of the British competition regulator (CMA), which on Wednesday expressed reservations about its takeover by Microsoft, announced more than a year ago.

© 2023 AFP