It's been yet another red day for the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) so far this Wednesday. After falling yesterday, the ASX 200 is backing up those losses with another day of red ink for investors. At the time of writing, the index has sunk by another 0.48% to just over 7,300 points.
But rather than dwelling on those sobering figures, let's instead check out the ASX 200 shares that are at the top of the share market's trading volume charts right now, according to investing.com.
The 3 most traded ASX 200 shares by volume this Wednesday
Pilbara Minerals Ltd (ASX: PLS)
First ASX 200 cab off the rank today is the leading lithium producer Pilbara Minerals. So far this Wednesday, a sizeable 19.45 million Pilbara shares have been swapped on the ASX.
We did get some news out of the company this morning, which revealed a $250 million debt facility has been approved for Pilbara with government agencies Export Finance Australia and Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility.
But that hasn't been enough for investors who have sent the Pilbara share price down by around 3.42% so far today. It's probably a combination of these events that has resulted in so many shares changing hands.
Sayona Mining Ltd (ASX: SYA)
Next up, we have Pilbara's fellow ASX 200 lithium stock Sayona. This Wednesday has seen a notable 20.1 million Sayona shares switch owners on the markets thus far. We also haven't seen any Sayona-specific news during this session.
But that hasn't stopped this lithium stock's share price from dropping too. In this case, Sayona shares have slumped by 1.4% so far to 21 cents a share. This is probably the reason why this company has appeared on this list today.
Origin Energy Ltd (ASX: ORG)
Our final ASX 200 share for today is energy stock Origin. Origin Energy has seen a hefty 34.43 million shares bought and sold this Wednesday so far. This one isn't too difficult to figure out. Origin shares have pole vaulted in value today. The company is currently up a pleasing 12.98% to $7.92 a share.
As my Fool colleague Brooke covered this morning, this seems to be the result of a new takeover offer from the consortium led by Brookfield Asset Management. The offer of $8.90 a share is lower than what the consortium previously offered.
But perhaps in light of Origin's latest earnings report, investors might have been expecting worse. Regardless, this is almost certainly the cause of the high volumes on display here.
