Nasdaq falls on Apple shares slump

U.S. stocks traded mostly lower in the morning session on Wednesday, as Wall Street weighed by Apple shares sharp decline on worse than expected earnings, ahead of the scheduled release of the U.S. Federal Reserve statement.

At midday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average ticked up 15.38 points, or 0.09 percent, to 18,005.70. The S&P 500 shed 1.90 points, or 0.09 percent, to 2,089.80. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 36.73 points, or 0.75 percent, to 4,851.56.

Apple, the tech giant, announced financial results after Tuesday's closing bell for its fiscal 2016 second quarter ended March 26, 2016, which showed the first year-over-year slump of both quarterly revenue and profit since 2003 and the first ever drop in iPhone sales. Shares of Apple plummeted 5.65 percent around midday trading Wednesday.

The company posted quarterly revenue of 50.6 billion U.S. dollars, a 33 percent drop from the first quarter and down 13 percent from a year ago. Its quarterly net income decreased 22 percent from one year ago to 10.5 billion dollars.

Meanwhile, investors kept a close eye on the Fed's policy meeting. The Federal Open Market Committee will announce its latest rate decision when it concludes a two-day meeting later Wednesday.

The U.S. central bank is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged after a mixed bag of economic data and recent volatility in financial markets.

Investors will look into the statement for indications on the potential for a hike at the June meeting.

On the economic front, the goods and services deficit was 47.1 billion dollars in February, up 1.2 billion dollars from January's revised level of 45.9 billion dollars, according to the U.S. Commerce Department Wednesday. Enditem