At the close of the New York Stock Exchange, the Dow Jones was down 1.10%, the S&P 500 was down 1.20% and the NASDAQ Composite was down 1.35%.

JPMorgan Chase & Co was the top gainer among the components of the Dow Jones in today's trading, up 0.72 points (0.55%) to close at 132.46. Quotes of Goldman Sachs Group Inc fell by 1.10 points (0.32%) to close at 340.87. Johnson & Johnson shed 0.77 points or 0.43% to close at 176.66.

Shares of Apple Inc were the least gainers, the price of which fell by 3.99 points (3.07%), ending the session at 126.04. The Walt Disney Company was up 2.55% or 2.20 points to close at 84.17, while Dow Inc was down 2.34% or 1.20 points to close at 49. 99.

Leading gainers among the S&P 500 index components in today's trading were Generac Holdings Inc, which rose 5.61% to 96.26, Tesla Inc, which gained 3.31% to close at 112.71, and shares of Illumina Inc, which rose 1.08% to end the session at 190.81.

The least gainers were SolarEdge Technologies Inc, which shed 5.87% to close at 275.84. Shares of APA Corporation shed 5.16% to end the session at 45.18. Quotes of Southwest Airlines Company decreased in price by 5.16% to 32.19.

The leading gainers among the components of the NASDAQ Composite in today's trading were Kala Pharmaceuticals Inc, which rose 218.37% to hit 12.48, Minerva Surgical Inc, which gained 66.15% to close at 0.27, and also shares of Transcode Therapeutics Inc, which rose 51.82% to end the session at 0.61.

The least gainers were Minerva Neurosciences Inc, which shed 39.15% to close at 1.43. Shares of Model Performance Acquisition Corp lost 35.54% to end the session at 8.78. Quotes Lightjump Acquisition Corp fell in price by 37.11% to 11.95.

On the New York Stock Exchange, the number of securities that fell in price (2407) exceeded the number of those that closed in positive territory (717), while quotes of 69 shares remained virtually unchanged. On the NASDAQ stock exchange, 2,412 companies fell in price, 1,348 rose, and 156 remained at the level of the previous close.

The CBOE Volatility Index, which is based on S&P 500 options trading, rose 2.26% to 22.14.

Gold futures for February delivery lost 0.59%, or 10.70, to hit $1.00 a troy ounce. In other commodities, WTI crude for February delivery fell 1.08%, or 0.86, to $78.67 a barrel. Futures for Brent crude for March delivery fell 1.20%, or 1.02, to $83.66 a barrel.

Meanwhile, in the Forex market, the EUR/USD pair remained unchanged at 0.24% to 1.06, while USD/JPY edged up 0.72% to hit 134.45.

Futures on the USD index rose 0.34% to 104.24.