Stock market today: Wall Street holds firm after inflation report helps clear the way for rate cuts [Video]

TOKYO – Wall Street is holding relatively steady Wednesday after the latest update on inflation came in almost exactly as economists expected.

The S&P 500 was edging down by 0.2% in morning trading, coming off one of its best days of the year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up by 42 points, or 0.1%, as of 10 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% lower.

Treasury yields were easing a bit in the bond market after initially wavering when the U.S. government said consumers paid prices that were 2.9% higher last month for gasoline, food, shelter and other things than a year earlier.

The data should keep the Federal Reserve on track to cut its main interest rate at its next meeting in September, a move that Wall Street has long been looking forward to. The Fed has been keeping rates at an economy-crunching level in hopes of stifling inflationthat topped 9% two years ago, and lower …