US stocks ended mostly lower on Tuesday as markets await guidance on the Federal Reserve’s rate-hiking strategy.

US oil futures closed higher in the previous session on hopes China would ease its tight Covid-19 restrictions that had raised concerns about global economic growth.

shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company HPE gained in after-hours trading on Tuesday after the company reported positive fourth-quarter results and issued strong guidance for the first quarter.

Major sectors of the S&P 500 ended mixed, with real estate and energy stocks posting the biggest gains on Tuesday. However, IT stocks were among the worst performers in the previous session.

The Nasdaq 100 fell 0.73% to close at 11,503.45 on Tuesday amid a stock decline of apple inc and Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN. The S&P 500 fell 0.16%, while the Dow Jones was up around 3 points to settle at 33,852.53 in the previous session.

The Chicago Board Options Exchange’s CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) fell 1.4% to 21.89 points.

What is the CBOE Volatility Index?

The CBOE Volatility Index, popularly known as the VIX, is a measure of stock market volatility expectations based on call and put options of the S&P 500 index options.