Updated 2 min read
US stocks edged lower on Thursday, backing off from a powerful rally driven by the US-Iran truce as the one-day-old ceasefire appeared increasingly fragile ahead of planned talks.
Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) dropped roughly 0.3%, after the blue-chip benchmark closed out Wednesday over 1,300 points higher on the prospect of a reopening of the key Strait of Hormuz.
The S&P 500 (^GSPC) fell 0.1%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) retreated to just below the flat line.
The two-week pause in Middle East hostilities agreed by the US and Iran looks to be in jeopardy. Both sides have accused the other of breaching the agreement, which hinges on a key condition: that Tehran reopens the Strait of Hormuz, a vital global oil shipping route that has been shut for weeks amid the conflict.
Iran has again halted tanker traffic, saying continued strikes by US ally Israel on Lebanon violated the deal. In return, President Trump said US troops will be kept in the region until Tehran complies with the “real agreement.”
Oil prices rebounded from their biggest one-day decline since April 2020, surging amid revived worries about supply disruption. US benchmark West Texas Intermediate futures (CL=F) jumped 5% to $99 a barrel, while the international counterpart Brent crude futures (BZ=F) were up 3% to just below $97.
The latest BEA release of the Federal Reserve’s favored inflation gauge, the PCE index, showed a 3% annual rate in February for the “core” measure, which strips out volatile food and energy prices. That was in line with economists’ estimates and is likely to keep the central bank on hold.
An update on initial jobless claims came in at 219,000 for the week ended April 4, according to data released by the Department of Labor on Thursday, an increase over the previous week’s 203,000 claims.
LIVE 13 updates
-
Maybe home sales last month weren’t so strong after all
Not long after Zillow reported signs of life in the housing market last month, Redfin is seeing indications that the Iran War is chilling transactions.
The brokerage said in a report on Thursday that contract signings were down 2.4% year-over-year in the four weeks through April 5, the worst decline in three months. New listings were down 2.6% in the same period.
Easter weekend likely had some impact on the results, as did rising mortgage rates stemming from the Iran War and inflation worries.
At the start of 2026, home sales showed hope of improving, following three consecutive years of record-low sales. Easing mortgage rates and slowing home price appreciation were expected to bring more buyers and sellers off the sidelines during the traditional busy spring homebuying season. Mortgage rates fell below 6% in late February, but the breakthrough was short-lived — rates quickly moved back up when the war broke out.
But there’s still some hope for spring: This week’s ceasefire agreement could help bring mortgage rates back toward the low 6% area from their current levels around 6.4%, Redfin’s report said.
-
Chips and builders of the real economy are catching a bid
Chip stocks are back at fresh highs — and they’re not alone. Today’s intraday record-high list is spreading into industrial names, transportation & logistics, and a cluster of utilities.
Here are this morning’s intraday record highs:
Dow Jones Sectors/Industries: Dow Transports (^DJT), Telecom Equipment, Utilities, Electrical Components & Equipment, Electronic & Electrical, Gas Distribution, Heavy Construction, Marine Transportation, Multiutilities, Retail Apparel, Gas Water Multiutilities
Industry/Style ETFs: Semiconductors (SOXX), Tanker Shipping (BWET)
Consumer discretionary stocks: Ross Stores (ROST), TJX (TJX)
Industrials stocks: Comfort Systems (FIX), Kirby (KEX), Powell Industries (POWL), Quanta Services (PWR), TechnipFMC (FTI), Wabtec (WAB)
Materials stocks: Corning (GLW)
Real estate stocks: Equinix (EQIX)
Tech stocks: KLA (KLAC), Monolithic Power Systems (MPWR), Sandisk (SNDK), Teradyne (TER)
Utilities stocks: Ameren (AEE), American Electric Power (AEP), Alliant Energy (LNT), Atmos Energy (ATO), CMS Energy (CMS), Entergy (ETR), NextEra Energy (NEE), NiSource (NI), Sempra (SRE), WEC Energy Group (WEC)
Energy stocks: Tenaris (TS)
-
Stocks retreat at the open, oil gains
Wednesday’s stock rally stalled at the open as markets grew more uncertain that a temporary truce between the US and Iran would hold.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) led stocks lower, falling 0.3% in retreat from Wednesday’s sharp rally. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) dropped roughly 0.2%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) nudged down 0.1%.
CoreWeave (CRWV) stock moved higher at the open after the neocloud company expanded its partnership with Meta (META). BlackBerry (BB) stock also jumped, up 10% at the open following better-than-expected earnings.
Oil prices climbed again, though West Texas Intermediate futures (CL=F) and Brent crude futures (BZ=F) remained below $100 per barrel.
Treasurys were flat, with the 10-year yield (^TNX) holding at 4.29%.
-
Initial jobless claims rise more than expected
Initial jobless claims rose to 219,000 in the week ended April 4, according to data released by the Department of Labor on Thursday, increasing from the previous week’s 203,000 claims.
Economists had expected initial claims of 210,000 for the week, according to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
Continuing claims, which track the unemployed population still seeking work, fell to 1.79 million for the week ended March 28, below economists’ expectations of 1.83 million and the previous week’s 1.83 million.
-
Fed’s preferred measure of inflation rises 0.4% in February, in line with estimates
Prices rose by 0.4% in February over the previous month, according to Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) index data released Friday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
The growth was in line with economists’ expectations of 0.4%, according to Bloomberg’s consensus estimates, ticking up just slightly from January’s 0.3%.
“Core” PCE, which excludes the more volatile food and energy categories, rose 0.4% on the month, in line with the previous month’s 0.4% growth. Economists had also predicted that the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure would rise by 0.4%.
On an annual basis, the headline and core PCE price indexes rose 2.8% and 3%, respectively, in December from the previous year, in line with expectations.
Meanwhile, personal income fell by 0.1% in December on a monthly basis, coming in sharply below the previous month’s 0.4% growth and economist expectations of 0.3% growth.
Personal spending increased 0.5% from last month, coming in below expectations of 0.6% but above the previous month’s growth of 0.4%.
-
Oil prices rise as US-Iran ceasefire looks increasingly shaky
Oil prices surged on Thursday morning as military action continued in the Middle East and movement through the Strait of Hormuz remained at a standstill, reversing some of the steep pricing drops in the hours after President Trump’s ceasefire announcement on Tuesday morning.
Futures on Brent crude (BZ=F), the international pricing benchmark, gained more than 4% to trade above $98 per barrel, while those on US benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude (CL=F) picked up more than 5% to trade above $99 per barrel.
The US-Iran agreement for a temporary ceasefire looked increasingly fragile as military action by Iran and Israel has continued throughout the region, and senior Iranian leaders claimed the US had violated its side of the truce.
In a post to X on Wednesday, Iranian parliamentary speaker and former IRGC general Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who has emerged as a leading voice within the regime, said the US and Iran’s framework deal for negotiation “has been openly and clearly violated,” making a ceasefire or negotiations “unreasonable.”
The parliamentary speaker cited Israel’s continued campaign in Lebanon against the Iran-backed terrorist proxy force Hezbollah, drones intruding into Iranian airspace, and the US denial of Iran’s “right to [nuclear] enrichment,” which has been a consistent red line for the Trump administration.
The Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most critical shipping chokepoint for energy products, has remained essentially closed to through traffic. Only four vessels crossed the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, marking a decline from the average of nine per day over the previous five days, according to data from S&P Global Intelligence.
In comments to reporters Wednesday night, Vice President JD Vance said that if the US doesn’t see the Strait of Hormuz beginning to reopen, the White House is “not going to abide by our terms if the Iranians are not abiding by their terms.”
-
Meta, CoreWeave expand partnership with $21 billion deal
Meta (META) and CoreWeave (CRWV) are expanding their collaboration on artificial intelligence infrastructure as demand for large-scale AI workloads grows.
The two companies announced the deal on Thursday, where CoreWeave will provide Meta with AI cloud capacity, including some initial deployments of Nvidia’s (NVDA) Vera Rubin platform, through December 2032 for approximately $21 billion.
This latest deal extends the two companies’ partnership, following Meta’s September 2025 agreement to pay $14 billion for compute capacity through 2031.
Meta stock rose 1.6% in premarket trading on Thursday on top of a more than 6% gain the day before, as Wall Street gave a bullish reception to the company’s new AI model, Muse Spark, aimed at competing with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude.
CoreWeave stock jumped over 3% in premarket trading.
-
Tesla is developing a new smaller, cheaper EV
Tesla (TSLA) may be working on a smaller, cheaper electric SUV, according to a Reuters report on Thursday.
Reuters reports:
-
Premarket trending tickers: Occidental, Intel, and Norwegian Cruise Line
Occidental Petroleum Corp (OXY) stock rose 1% before the bell on Thursday following the news that the truce between the US and Iran was on fragile ground, leading oil prices and energy stocks to rise.
Intel (INTC) stock fell more than 1% during premarket hours on Thursday. The chipmaker’s shares closed 11% up on Wednesday due to investor enthusiasm over recent business developments.
Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd. (NCLH) and other travel stocks share prices fell roughly around 1% today during premarket hours as the US-Iran truce looked shaky after Tehran announced it had been violated. This led to a rise in oil prices and caused investors to grow uneasy that the cost of fuel would continue to rise.
-
Investors tried to redeem $20 billion from private credit funds in Q1
Wealthy investors attempted to pull more than $20 billion from private credit funds in the first quarter, underscoring the growing strain on an asset class that had boomed into a dominant force on Wall Street, per the Financial Times.
The FT reports:
(Disclosure: Yahoo is a portfolio company of funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management.)
-
Goldman flags $100-plus Brent if Hormuz stays shut another month
Bloomberg reports:
Brent crude (BZ=F) is set to average more than $100 a barrel through 2026 if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for another month, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
“The situation remains fluid,” analysts including Daan Struyven said in a note after the start of a two-week ceasefire between the US and Iran, noting comments from Vice President JD Vance that the truce was fragile. “We continue to see the risks to our price forecast as skewed to the upside,” they said.
The oil market remains fixated on the strait, which has been largely closed since the US and Israeli attack on Iran in February that ignited the war. While Tehran and Washington said they paused the fighting in exchange for a reopening of the conduit, there’s little clarity on what was agreed.
At present, Goldman’s base-case outlook is for flows through the strait to start picking up this weekend, followed by a gradual, one-month recovery in Persian Gulf exports to pre-war levels. Under that scenario, Brent is seen averaging $82 a barrel in the third quarter and $80 in the fourth.
-
Anthropic employees hold onto shares in greater numbers than expected in tender offer
Bloomberg reports:
-
Oil bounces after biggest single-day drop since 2020
Bloomberg reports:
