us stocks edged up in choppy trading wednesday a day after a selloff that sent the dow jones industrial average down by nearly 700 points and wiped out 2023 gains for the bluechip gauge investors are also awaiting the minutes from the federal reserves february policy meeting which are due to be published at 2 pm eastern for more clues on its plans for hiking interest rates on tuesday the dow fell nearly 700 points or 21 while the sp 500 declined 2 and the nasdaq composite dropped 25 making it the worst day of 2023 so far for all three major indexes us stocks edged up wednesday after posting the biggest daily selloff in over two months as concerns about higher borrowing costs continued to weigh on investor sentiment traders are also eyeing the minutes of the feds jan 31feb 1 policy meeting which will be published at 2 pm eastern for more insight on the central banks future monetarytightening plans the fed delivered an increase to the fedfunds rate of 25 basis points or quarter of a percentage point at that meeting ever since the fed decided that it needed to be more transparent by broadening its communication effort the release of the fed minutes from the previous fed meeting has been diminished somewhat in terms of gleaning fundamental policyrelated surprises said quincy krosby chief global strategist at lpl financial in a wednesday note todays release however is highly anticipated by bond and equity markets alike as treasury yields continue to inch higher with the 12month note now offering 5057 and the 10year note hovering just below 400 and an equity market that is focused on the feds trajectory as well as the effect of the higher cost of capital on companies and higher interest rates for consumers she said us stocks marched higher to kick off the year on hopes that easing inflation might allow the fed to start cutting interest rates which have increased steadily since march 2022 later in the year however recent data has shown that inflation remains stubbornly high well above the feds 2 annual target and that the us economy remains resilient despite the feds sharp tightening of monetary policy which has pushed bond yields higher in anticipation of further fed hawkishness the 2year treasury yields on tuesday flirted with their highest level since 2007 dropping to 4671 compared with 4729 on the previous day the market reprices information quickly said eric merlis managing director and cohead of global markets at citizens the stock markets recent retreat is a recognition that the fed has more to go with its interestrate hikes and may not be easing its monetary policy this year merlis said in a call st louis fed president james bullard on wednesday said he thought markets had previously overpriced the risk of recession in the second half of 2022 and the first half of 2023 and may now be overpricing the risk in the second half of this year bullard who isnt a voting member of the ratesetting federal open market committee this year continues to expect a peak fedfunds rate of 538  or a range of 525 to 55 last week bullard and cleveland fed president loretta mester said they had argued for a 50basispoint hike in the fedfunds rate at the february meeting this is the market reading into those comments from fed officials looking at the inflation data as well as other reports that seem to suggest that number one the labor market is still very very tight  youre really not seeing softness there yet and the fact that from an activity standpoint youre seeing signs of reacceleration said jake jolly head of investment analysis at bny mellon investment management all of that paints a picture of an economy that is really inconsistent and that translates into a federal reserve that really needs to keep its foot on the brake jolly told marketwatch via phone need to knowheres why one technical analyst says the stock market is due a bounce after the 697point selloff in the dow