Wednesday Sector Leaders: Materials, Energy

The best performing sector as of midday Wednesday is the Materials sector, higher by 0.7%. Within that group, FMC Corp. (Symbol: FMC) and LyondellBasell Industries NV (Symbol: LYB) are two of the day's stand-outs, showing a gain of 2.4% and 2.3%, respectively. Among the high volume ETFs, one ETF closely following materials stocks is the Materials Select Sector SPDR ETF (Symbol: XLB), which is up 0.8% on the day, and up 5.16% year-to-date. FMC Corp., meanwhile, is down 0.52% year-to-date, and LyondellBasell Industries NV is up 17.72% year-to-date. Combined, FMC and LYB make up approximately 4.6% of the underlying holdings of XLB.

The next best performing sector is the Energy sector, up 0.6%. Among large Energy stocks, Pioneer Natural Resources Co (Symbol: PXD) and Trane Technologies plc (Symbol: TT) are the most notable, showing a gain of 2.4% and 2.4%, respectively. One ETF closely tracking Energy stocks is the Energy Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLE), which is up 0.6% in midday trading, and up 4.00% on a year-to-date basis. Pioneer Natural Resources Co, meanwhile, is up 4.98% year-to-date, and Trane Technologies plc is up 2.52% year-to-date. PXD makes up approximately 3.8% of the underlying holdings of XLE.

Comparing these stocks and ETFs on a trailing twelve month basis, below is a relative stock price performance chart, with each of the symbols shown in a different color as labeled in the legend at the bottom:

Here's a snapshot of how the S&P 500 components within the various sectors are faring in afternoon trading on Wednesday. As you can see, eight sectors are up on the day, while one sector is down.

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