The IBEX 35 opened on Wednesday with a slight cut as it awaits the results of technology giant Nvidia, in a context of caution after comments from members of the Fed that pointed to the possibility that interest rates will remain high for longer than desired by the financial markets.

Nevertheless, the Spanish stock index remained close to its highest levels in almost 9 years, in view of the recent favorable evolution of corporate results and a lower interest rate horizon at the end of the year, despite the oscillations in market forecasts in this regard.

In this regard, Boston Fed President Susan Collins and her Cleveland counterpart Loretta Mester said Tuesday that the U.S. central bank should wait several more months to ensure that inflation is indeed returning to its 2% target before cutting interest rates.

However, the cold water for hopes of monetary easing was tempered pending the minutes of the Fed's latest meeting, where new signals on the timetable for cutting the cost of debt in the United States could be forthcoming.

"(...) we expect no surprises, confirming the idea that, although inflation may take longer than expected to approach the 2% target, and although the path towards it will be bumpy, the next interest rate move will be downward," said the Renta 4 brokerage house.

"We recall that we expect 2 Fed rate cuts in 2024, the first of them after the summer. These expectations are reinforced by the latest data on both inflation and employment and private consumption," these analysts added.

Elsewhere, investors were positioning themselves for Nvidia's results, which could bring more positive news on the impact of the artificial intelligence rush on its business.

Still, some experts warned that current share prices for Nvidia and the technology sector as a whole already reflect very optimistic estimates for the U.S. processor maker's numbers, so the room for disappointment is large.

Against this backdrop, at 07:05 GMT on Wednesday, the selective Spanish stock market index IBEX 35 was down 17.00 points, or 0.15%, to 11,317.90 points, while the FTSE Eurofirst 300 index of large European stocks was down 0.27%.

The IBEX thus remained close to the 11,362 points touched on May 15, its highest level since July 23, 2015.

As for individual stocks, in the banking sector Santander rose 0.21%, BBVA scored 0.59%, Caixabank advanced 0.20%, Sabadell gained 0.66% and Bankinter appreciated 0.53% .

Among the large non-financial stocks, Telefónica fell 0.28%, Inditex dropped 0.09%, Iberdrola lost 0.32%, Cellnex fell 1.04%, and the oil company Repsol lost 0.47%.

(Information by Tomás Cobos; edited by Javi West Larrañaga)