Wall Street closes lower with decline in oil prices

NEW YORK (AA) – Wall Street closed lower Thursday with falling crude prices.

The Dow Jones lost 40 points to end at 18,162. The S&P 500 was down two points to 2,141 and the Nasdaq ended four points lower at 5,241.

Investors took a short-term selling position for profit after oil prices rose around 2 percent Wednesday.

At the final bell, American benchmark West Texas Intermediate was trading at $50.59 per barrel -- a 2.4 percent decline. International benchmark Brent crude was at $51.37 per barrel -- a 2.5 percent loss.