Markets
WH Briefing Iran 4/6/26
(Getty Images)

Stocks sink and oil spikes as traders price in enduring, worsening Mideast war

Stocks and oil are building in more risk premium to deal with the perceived increased probability of a more drawn-out disruption to global energy supplies and shipments.

Luke Kawa

US stocks are sinking while oil futures spike as traders price in a worsening of the Mideast war that they had hoped would end imminently.

Front-month West Texas Intermediate futures are trading at $117.63, their highest level during this conflict outside of the Sunday night open on March 8. And the SPDR S&P 500 ETF was down about 1.2% at its lows of the day, with the Invesco QQQ Trust faring even worse.

The New York Times is reporting that Iran has stopped negotiation efforts with the US. And after pushing back previous deadlines, US President Donald Trump has pledged that if a deal to end the conflict that includes the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz is not reached by 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday, the US will attack the country’s power plants and bridges.

Stock futures returned to negative territory around 6:25 a.m. after Iranian state-sponsored media reported on explosions at Kharg Island, which handles about 90% of the Gulf nation’s oil exports. Fox News later reported that the US hit military targets but also unintentionally struck a landing dock.

“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS?”

The “WHO KNOWS?” uncertainty of it all is prompting traders in stocks and oil to build in an additional risk premium to deal with the heightened risk of a more drawn-out disruption to global energy supplies and shipments.

That’s the opposite of what markets did on Monday, when investors were in a holding pattern and not building in any sort of event premium related to military action on Tuesday night. The trading range in the SPDR S&P 500 ETF on Monday was the smallest since before the conflict began.

More Markets

See all Markets
Tasha Matsumoto
8m
Stocks eke out gain ahead of tonight’s deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz

Traders were jittery ahead of the looming deadline, while President Trump posted on Truth Social that “a whole civilization will die tonight” if an agreement is not reached.

Bull with Nose Ring
Luke Kawa
41m
Anthropic is releasing its new model to select companies to get a head start on cyber defense

Fortune reported that the Claude developer would be doing this in late March.

Co-founder and CEO of Anthropic, Dario Amodei
markets
Matt Phillips

Samsung’s massive Q1 fails to lift Sandisk, other data center plays

Almost all memory stocks slipped Tuesday, despite getting a positive update on the massive flood of money pouring into the sector from the AI build-out, as the potential escalation of the US war with Iran Tuesday evening overshadowed Samsung’s blowout numbers.

Korean chip giant Samsung Electronics reported preliminary Q1 results showing operating profit up by 755% compared to Q1 2025, trouncing pretty elevated expectations for a gain of about 550%.

Samsung is the world’s largest producer of NAND and DRAM chips. Once considered low-value commodity inputs to tech products, NAND and DRAM prices have exploded over the last six months amid a hyperscaler scramble to secure chips that can manage the surfeit of data produced by AI.

The same dynamics have made memory plays like Sandisk, Western Digital, and Micron some of the best-performing stocks in the S&P 500 over the last 12 months.

But other than Seagate Technology Holdings, those stocks were down Tuesday as of 11:15 a.m. ET, as the surge in oil prices and ongoing war with Iran muted much of the AI data center trade excitement. Bellwethers like Nvidia and hyperscalers like Oracle and Meta were struggling early, as were data center input makers like Corning and Coherent, AI power plays like GE Vernova, Vertiv Holdings, and even hard-hat builders of the shells that house all those AI servers.

On the other hand, some so-called optical stocks — makers of fiber-optic connections that quickly shift data between users, hyperscalers, and all around data centers themselves — were up. Lumentum and Arista Networks, two popular optical stocks, were showing resilience.

Samsung flags eightfold jump in quarterly profit as AI chip demand pumps prices

Samsung flags eightfold jump in quarterly profit as AI chip demand pumps prices

Samsung is the world’s largest producer of NAND and DRAM chips. Once considered low-value commodity inputs to tech products, NAND and DRAM prices have exploded over the last six months amid a hyperscaler scramble to secure chips that can manage the surfeit of data produced by AI.

The same dynamics have made memory plays like Sandisk, Western Digital, and Micron some of the best-performing stocks in the S&P 500 over the last 12 months.

But other than Seagate Technology Holdings, those stocks were down Tuesday as of 11:15 a.m. ET, as the surge in oil prices and ongoing war with Iran muted much of the AI data center trade excitement. Bellwethers like Nvidia and hyperscalers like Oracle and Meta were struggling early, as were data center input makers like Corning and Coherent, AI power plays like GE Vernova, Vertiv Holdings, and even hard-hat builders of the shells that house all those AI servers.

On the other hand, some so-called optical stocks — makers of fiber-optic connections that quickly shift data between users, hyperscalers, and all around data centers themselves — were up. Lumentum and Arista Networks, two popular optical stocks, were showing resilience.

markets
Max Knoblauch

Paramount surges on bullish options activity, 1 day after $24 billion Gulf backing report

Paramount Skydance shares surged more than 9% shortly after markets opened on Tuesday, on pace for their best day since news that the company had emerged victorious in the Warner Bros. bidding war broke in late February.

The entertainment giant is being propelled by bullish options activity, with about 17,000 call options having changed hands as of 10:03 a.m. ET, already ahead of the 20-day average for a full session.

The market move comes a day after reports that three Gulf sovereign wealth funds would back Paramount’s offer for WBD to the tune of $24 billion. Those working on the deal don’t expect the Gulf funds’ involvement to spark any additional regulatory reviews.

markets
Matt Phillips

Intel rises on news it will join Elon Musk’s Terafab project

US chipmaking icon Intel announced that it’s joining Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s ambitious Terafab chipmaking project, sending the stock up early Tuesday.

As Sherwood News’ Rani Molla reported late last month:

“Terafab aims to bring all aspects of chip production — from design to fabrication to packaging — under one roof. Musk said the facility is intended to produce up to 1 terawatt of compute annually. The plant would manufacture inference chips for Tesla’s Robotaxis and Optimus robots, as well as custom AI chips for space-based applications, including solar-powered AI satellites. Morgan Stanley estimates the project could cost $35 billion to $45 billion in capital expenditure, likely shared between Tesla and SpaceX.”

That would be a healthy chunk of change for Intel to access, and could offer an opportunity to turn around both the finances and the narrative surrounding Intel’s struggling foundry chipmaking operations.

Latest Stories

Sherwood Media, LLC produces fresh and unique perspectives on topical financial news and is a fully owned subsidiary of Robinhood Markets, Inc., and any views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of any other Robinhood affiliate, including Robinhood Markets, Inc., Robinhood Financial LLC, Robinhood Securities, LLC, Robinhood Crypto, LLC, Robinhood Derivatives, LLC, or Robinhood Money, LLC. Futures and event contracts are offered through Robinhood Derivatives, LLC.
©2026 Sherwood Media, LLC