On Monday the U.S. equity markets finished in the green. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 46,946 points, up 0.8 % from the previous day. A few minutes earlier, the S&P 500 had risen about 1.0 % to roughly 6,699 points, while the Nasdaq 100 was up 1.1 % at around 24,655 points.
Investor focus turned to recent geopolitical developments in the Strait of Hormuz and Nvidia’s new product roadmap. Iran has just allowed two Indian tankers to pass through the strait, prompting U.S. President Donald Trump to pressure NATO allies to militarily secure the oil passage. The effect was a sharp drop in benchmark prices: a barrel of North Sea Brent traded at $100.20 at 21:00 German time, down 29.6 cents-or 2.9 %-from the previous day’s close.
Tech markets also weighed expectations around artificial intelligence. Nvidia announced the Groq 3 chip, marking a shift from a primary focus on GPUs, which are typically used to train language models, to LPUs that are optimized for fast AI responses.
On the currency front, the euro gained strength. One euro bought $1.1510, while one dollar was worth €0.8688.
Gold finished the session weaker, trading at $5,011 per troy ounce-down 0.3 %-which equates to €139.96 per gram.