Good morning and welcome to today's market chronicle. It's Monday, June 29, 2026. Peace has broken out over the weekend, allegedly, and le tout-Wall Street has decided to believe it before the bell.
Here is the story we are being sold. The US and Iran reportedly agreed to stop shooting at each other long enough to keep talking, futures caught a bid, and the Strait of Hormuz reopened wide enough for Saudi Arabia to start loading tankers at Ras Tanura again. So S&P futures are up about 0.7% into the open, the Nasdaq a touch more, and everyone is congratulating themselves for buying a dip they spent all of Friday refusing to touch. The wonderful world of finance, where conviction arrives precisely one weekend too late.
Oil is the one telling the truth. WTI sits near 69 dollars, the lowest since February, down roughly 20% from its war-scare highs, because crude does not care about your peace narrative, it cares about barrels actually moving, and barrels are moving. Gold meanwhile drifts around 4,040 an ounce, up for a second session after a PCE print that surprised absolutely no one.
And yet. While the leader of the free world takes his victory lap, US destroyers and Iranian boats reportedly traded fire in that very Strait over the weekend, a detail the rally has elegantly filed under noise. Everyone pretends not to notice that a ceasefire being tested with live rounds is not the same thing as peace. TACO or not, you do not price permanent calm off a framework that is being shot at while you read this.
What's ahead. Today is thin and quiet, the appetizer. Wednesday brings ADP and ISM manufacturing, then the main event, the June jobs report, pulled forward to Thursday because Friday the whole circus is shut for Independence Day. Translation: one crucial payrolls number dumped into a half-empty pre-holiday market, everyone's hand already on the exit. The Fed is watching it like a hawk pretending to be dovish, and so is anyone short the front end.
The rest of the tape. The 10-year yield sits at 4.39%, basically asleep, down a touch on the week. Bitcoin, our designated canary, just closed its worst month in memory near 59,000, down almost a fifth in June with some four billion dollars stampeding out of the ETFs. The asset that was going to replace the dollar is busy being replaced by the urge to sell it.
Enjoy the peace rally while it lasts, which may be until the next headline out of Hormuz. Thin week, big number, short fuses. Stay sharp, and see you tomorrow.