Midday Mashup
Published
The split between equity risk appetite and an escalating Gulf energy crisis that defined the morning has only widened into midday, with the S&P 500 extending its advance even as the Strait of Hormuz standoff takes a sharply more dangerous turn. SPY is now up 0.6%, roughly triple its premarket gain, led by Technology at +1.8%.
The security backdrop has deteriorated. The Houthi conflict with Saudi Arabia is widening beyond energy and military targets to airports and Aramco's Dhahran headquarters, forcing a suspension of operations at Riyadh's King Khalid International Airport, even as Aramco says its Yanbu and Shaybah facilities themselves took no damage. Iran's Revolutionary Guard says it is preparing to unveil a new weapon it calls the "Father of All Bombs," while a separate report says Trump has ordered plans drawn up to strike Iran's energy infrastructure with the "Mother of All Bombs" if combat resumes. Treasury has added fresh Iran-related sanctions. Yet diplomacy has not shut down entirely: Iran's Pezeshkian says Tehran has no intention of starting a war, Araghchi says Iran would give diplomacy another chance given sincere US engagement, and on the Ukraine track Russia has accepted a US proposal for trilateral talks, possibly in Abu Dhabi, with Washington separately accepting a technical-level meeting. The EIA reported a much larger crude draw than expected, -3060K barrels versus -324.2K expected, though Kuwait's oil chief says crude supply remains ample with fuels the real bottleneck.
Equity markets are shrugging off the headlines in favor of earnings and AI-linked momentum. Super Micro Computer leads movers, up 8.1% in regular trading after its preliminary quarterly sales guidance topped Wall Street estimates. Strategy Inc rises 8.5%, Charles River Laboratories gains 8.1%, Paramount Skydance adds 7.9% and Datadog climbs 7.9%. On the downside, FMC falls 6.3%, AT&T drops 6.1% despite raised long-term guidance, DexCom is off 5.5%, and Chipotle slides 5.0%. The Natural Gas ETF is down 4.8% even as oil-linked names like the Oil Services ETF gain.
Elsewhere, Abbott Laboratories is separating its roughly $8.5 billion Nutrition business into a standalone public company by the end of 2027, and a New Mexico judge has ordered Meta to pay $25 billion over a privacy and data-breach case tied to Cambridge Analytica.
© Raydn · raydn.us