Tax reform carried the day Wednesday with the Nasdaq climbing 1.15%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rising 0.25% and the S&P 500 increasing 0.41%.
Investors snapped up shares after Republicans finally unveiled their tax reform plan. The plan cuts the number of individual tax brackets to 3 from 7 while proposing a reduction in the corporate tax rate to 20%.
While the income thresholds for the brackets have yet to be determined, the rates were set for 12%, 25% and 35%.
Financials and banking sector stocks were the biggest beneficiaries, with Bank of America Corp. (BAC) having the strongest showing, climbing nearly 3% on heavy volume.
TheStreet has further coverage of the plan here.
Tyson Poultry Paid for Negligence at its Monett, Missouri Plant
2:30 PM ET
Tyson Foods Inc. (TSN) subsidiary Tyson Poultry plead guilty in federal court Wednesday to violating the Clean Water Act at its Monett, MO slaughter and processing plant, resulting in the death of 108,000 fish.
The plea agreement requires Tyson to pay $2 million criminal fine and $500,000 to clean up the mess it made in the Clear Creek waterway in the Monett area.
The violations occurred in 2014 when a tank at the company's feed mill began to leak an acidic liquid food supplement called Alimet.
Facebook Messenger's Head Wants His Product to Be Your Default Messaging Choice
1:28 PM ET
Facebook Inc. (FB) VP of messaging David Marcus told CNBC that Facebook Messenger "absolutely" wants to replace Apple's iMessage and Android messenger as your phone's default messaging app.
"Conversations tend to stick on Messenger because the next best alternative is not as good," Marcus said.
Woman Carried Off of Southwest Flight After Refusing to Disembark
10:52 AM ET
Southwest Airlines (LUV) is apologizing after video surfaced of transportation officials dragging a woman off of a flight Tuesday night.
The woman informed the crew that she had a life-threatening allergy to pets after she found out there were animals on board. She was ordered to exit the plane after she failed to produce a doctor's certificate proving her ailment.
"Our Flight Crew made repeated attempts to explain the situation to the Customer, however, she refused to deplane and law enforcement became involved," Southwest Airlines said in its statement. "We publicly offer our apologies to this customer for her experience and we will be contacting her directly to address her concerns."
NBC Los Angeles has video of the incident here.
The iPhone 8's New Glass Back Isn't as Resilient as Apple Has Suggested
10:10 AM ET
Apple has been plagued by reported soft sales of the latest version of its flagship device, but now third-party insurer SquareTrade has come out with a report saying that the iPhone 8 was significantly more brittle than rival Samsung's (SSNLF) Galaxy 8.
Squaretrade has a video detailing their findings below.
Famed Apple Insider Says iPhone Sales Aren't as Sluggish as Reports Say
Noted KGI Securities Apple Inc. (AAPL) analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says that reports that iPhone 8 sales are weak are overblown, based on estimates of production and research data from Localytics.
Apple shares bottomed out on Monday before bouncing back slightly Tuesday. Shares are still down nearly 4% over the past 5 sessions due to investor trepidation surrounding sales of its most popular product.
"We previously estimated the production weighting of new 2017 iPhone models at roughly 50% iPhone X and 50% iPhone 8/ 8 Plus. This matches what we believe is Apple's (US) estimate for demand. At first glance, the combined first-week adoption rate for the iPhone 8/ 8 Plus might appear low (about half that of iPhone 6s/ 6s Plus and 7/ 7 Plus). However, this is due to the fact that the iPhone X is not included, not because iPhone 8/ 8 Plus first weekend sales have been weak," Kuo said in his note, which was obtained by MacRumors.
VW's Scania Unit Fined $1.03 Billion for Price Fixing
Volkswagen AG's (VLKAY) bad run with regulators continued after the EU Commission fined the German automakers Scania unit $1.03 billion for price fixing its trucks.
The Commission accuses Scania of colluding with up to five rivals for 14 years to fix truck prices and of passing on the costs of developing cleaner emissions technology.
VW also faces compensation claims from truck buyers, though Scania deny's any wrongdoing. This week's fine comes just months after VW was fined a record amount by the Commission over its emission scandal.
Lyft Adds Ford to Roster of Partners in Self-Driving Collaboration
8:13 a.m. ET
Ford Co. (F) is enlisting ride-hailing service Lyft to help it develop a fleet of self-driving vehicles, the companies announced Wednesday.
Ford has already announced plans to work with Domino's Pizza Inc. (DPZ) to use self-driving vehicles for deliveries, and now the company is also seeing what its technology can do for the ride-hailing industry.
"Lyft has a network of customers, growing demand for rides and strong knowledge of transportation flow within cities. We have experience with autonomous vehicle technology development and large scale manufacturing. Both companies have fleet management and big data experience. With our combined capabilities, we believe we can effectively share information to help make the best decisions for the future," Ford said in a statement.
Lyft already teams with Jaguar, GM Co. (GM) and Alphabet Inc.'s (GOOGL) Waymo.
