Close Update: US Stocks Turn Higher as Investors Weigh Omicron Effects on Economy, Look Toward Friday's Inflation Report

US stocks closed higher despite a wobbly Wednesday session as investors continued to assess the economic impact of the COVID-19 omicron variant while looking ahead to the inflation report on Friday.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.1% to 35,754.29, the S&P 500 was up 0.3% to 4,701.21 and the Nasdaq Composite rose 0.6% to 15,786.99. Communication services and healthcare led the gainers among the sectors, with financials, consumer staples and utilities the only decliners.

The 10-year US Treasury yield jumped 4.6 basis points to 1.53%.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil climbed 0.9% to $72.71 a barrel. Total crude oil inventories fell by 1.9 million barrels in the week ended Dec. 3, but commercial oil inventories declined by only 200,000 barrels compared with expectations for a much larger decrease.

Following Chair Jerome Powell's comments last week, market expectations are for the Fed to double the pace of tapering its asset purchase program. The move will give the central bank the optionality to lift interest rates sooner if needed. Currently, two to three rate increases are priced in the market for 2022, while the curve between the two- and 10-year Treasury yields is flattening.

Pfizer PFE and BioNTech BNTX said Wednesday preliminary results from a laboratory study showed antibodies from their COVID-19 vaccine, BNT162b2, neutralize the virus' omicron variant after three doses.

In other economic news, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that job openings rose to 11 million in October from 10.6 million in September, while hiring fell to 6.46 million from 6.55 million, well below the level of openings as the supply of available labor remains tight. At the same time, the number of people leaving jobs declined but remained elevated as workers felt more confident about finding another job if they are unhappy with their current one.

In company news, on the Nasdaq, the two biggest gainers were DocuSign DOCU, up 11%, and Peloton PTON, which jumped 10%.

In the S&P 500, among the five top performers were Norwegian Cruise Holdings NCLH and United Airlines UAL, which were among the hardest hit by the pandemic. Shares of the duo jumped 8% and 4%, respectively. In the Dow, one of the biggest gainers was Boeing BA, which also struggled during the crisis.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil climbed $0.57 to $72.58 a barrel.

In other company news, Stitch Fix SFIX cut its revenue outlook for the fiscal second quarter as the online personal styling platform anticipates a decline in net client additions, undermining its beat in the three-month period just ended. SFIX shares plunged 24%.

Photronics PLAB increased 26% after the photomask manufacturer reported fiscal Q4 results breezing past Wall Street expectations and with projected net income and revenue for its current Q1 also exceeding analyst estimates for the three months ended Jan. 31.

Nuvei NVEI dropped almost 41% after short seller Spruce Point Capital Management Wednesday said the payment technologies company faces up to 40% to 60% downside risk to its share price, citing its "confounding" financial performance as a public company and alleging the company has shown "limited to no organic growth" over a prolonged period.

In the metals markets, gold was little changed at $1,784.00, silver was down 0.4% to $22.44 an ounce but copper was up 1.1% to $4.39 per pound. Among energy ETFs, the United States Oil Fund was up 1.6% to $52.42 and the United States Natural Gas Fund was up 2.3% to $12.50.