Good morning and welcome to Markets Desk, your Monday open.
Geopolitical risk is back at the front of the tape this morning after U.S. Central Command confirmed it intercepted Iranian missiles targeting American forces in Kuwait. The strike further erodes what remains of the U.S.-Iran ceasefire and complicates active diplomacy aimed at ending the broader conflict. Futures are pointing higher despite the tension, though that calculus could shift fast if the situation escalates.
On the energy side, Brent crude is sitting at ninety-six dollars and forty-two cents a barrel this morning, a modest fourteen cents above yesterday's close. The more striking figure is the longer arc — oil has surged nearly fifty percent over the past year, though it has pulled back sharply from one hundred sixteen dollars just a month ago. That one-month decline of seventeen percent reflects real demand uncertainty, and traders will be watching the Middle East headlines closely for any supply disruption signal.
Turning to tech, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang took the stage at Computex in Taiwan with the unveiling of the RTX Spark chip, designed to bring AI inference directly to laptops. Huang also pushed back on the narrative that AI eliminates software jobs, arguing it amplifies demand for developers. For a stock that has carried much of this bull market, his messaging carries weight well beyond the product launch itself.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
